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V 




THE BURDEN 


By the same Author 


SIDE ISSUES 
BREAKING POINT 
ESCAPE 


I 

THE BURDEN 

By JEFFERY E. JEFFERY 



NEW YORK 
THOMAS SELTZER 
1924 




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CONTENTS 

CHRISTINE. 1 

ALAN AND CHRISTINE.95 

ALAN.. . 165 






PART ONE 


Christine 

CHAPTER ONE 

\T twelve minutes past nine on a bright frosty morning 
in December, 1919, Christine Wracke-Helyar entered 
the dining-room of her father’s house at Richmond. By 
fourteen minutes past she had completed her inspection of 
the room, and had satisfied herself that there was no devia¬ 
tion from an admirably organised normal. Dust had been 
removed, the fire was adequate but not extravagant, break¬ 
fast was ready. The Times was on the left side of her 
father’s plate and his letters were on top of The Times. The 
mustard pot, concerning the emptiness of which there had 
been a complaint on the previous day, had been refilled, 
and one window was wide open. Attention to detail, especi¬ 
ally in the morning, was a matter of importance at Boldre 
House, for Brigadier-General Eustace Wracke-Helyar, C.B., 
retired, with more than thirty years’ service in the Royal 
Artillery behind him, depended for his bodily ease and 
mental peace upon adherence to a punctiliously rigid rou¬ 
tine, and was quick to resent any divergence from it in 
his household. 

Boldre House was one of a little group of flat-fronted 
buildings of the Georgian period lying behind Richmond 
Green, and approached from it through an archway of the 
old palace. The house and its neighbours formed one side 
of a triangle, of which the second side was a wing of the 
palace and the third a row of livery stables of black-and- 
white painted wood. In the middle there was a grass plot. 

1 


2 


THE BURDEN 


Christine, dressed for golf in a short tweed skirt, knitted 
jumper and brogues, stood by the window and waited for 
her father to come in from his morning ride. She was a 
tall girl of twenty-five, w$ll made and with a full figure for 
her years, but too erect and athletic looking to be in any 
way clumsy. The sunlight, coming in through the window, 
showed that there were light tints in her brown hair and 
proved that her clear complexion was genuine. Taken as a 
whole, her features suggested refinement first and good 
looks immediately afterwards. She was more than pretty— 
there was nothing of the doll-like type about her—but, on 
the other hand, she was less than beautiful. A middle-aged 
man of no scruples might have looked at her and said to 
himself: “She’ll be a devilish fine woman some day—worth 
chasing”; and a dumpy-figured mother of six might have 
thought: “I wish I was like what she’ll be when she’s 
forty.” 

The clock in the hall struck the quarter, and almost at 
the same moment she heard a clip-clop of hoofs. The gen¬ 
eral, punctual as always, rode in through the archway and 
handed over his horse at the stable door. She watched him 
cross the grass towards the house: tall and very straight 
he was, with beautifully cut breeches and an authoritative 
swagger in his walk. Then she turned towards the break¬ 
fast table, and as he entered the room she was adding the 
second lump of sugar to his coffee. It was thus every 
morning. The general liked precision in detail. 

“Mornin’, Chris,” he said abruptly, and kissed her cheek. 
“Good sort of a day, but the frost won’t last with this 
sun.” 

He helped himself to porridge and sat down. 

“What’s the news?” he asked, and without waiting for 
an answer, which he evidently did not expect, he propped 
The Times up in front of him and started to find out for 
himself. Christine meanwhile acquainted herself with the 
world’s happenings as presented photographically in the 
Daily Mirror. Presently, bored with that portion of the 
Press which routine allotted to her, she drew from its 


CHRISTINE 


3 

envelope a two-page letter written in a small and very neat 
handwriting and began to read it for the second time that 
morning. 

This was a provocative act, and she knew it to be so. 
But she had her reasons for being provocative. She was 
about to inform her father that she intended to go to a 
dance with her fiance on the following Friday. She knew 
that there would be objections. She knew that she would 
override the objections only after a fight, and she knew 
that she could fight better against her father, whom she 
loved, when she had provoked him to anger than she could 
when he was in the advantageous position of appealing 
to her affection for him. An upward glance as she turned 
the page of her letter showed her that he had seen what 
she was reading and was scowling. She pretended not to 
have noticed and went on, parting her lips in a faint smile, 
as though to convey to him that the contents of her letter 
were pleasingly sentimental. But behind her smile she was 
already growing angry. Her father’s features had assumed 
that expression of implacable antagonism with which she 
had become so familiar in the course of the past five months. 
She resented that expression. She regarded it as both 
humiliating and insulting, and she could never rid herself 
of the conviction that that hardening of his eyes and mouth 
was done deliberately and with the intention of wounding 
her feelings. Why, she asked herself, should he behave in 
this malignant, senseless way over her engagement? What 
right had he to declare that Alan Carnes, whom he scarcely 
knew, was totally unsuited to her, and that she was throwing 
herself away on a waster? Why—why, in heaven’s name 
—should he, who professed to be entirely devoted to her, 
set himself out to spoil what ought to have been one of 
the happiest times of her life? 

She dropped her letter and fidgeted with the ring on her 
third finger, a very dark sapphire encircled with diamonds. 
The general, with his features still hard set, was opening 
his correspondence. She watched the precise, methodical 
way he slit the envelopes and laid them aside. She examined 


4 


THE BURDEN 


his profile—his straight nose below his obstinate forehead, 
his clipped and bristly grey moustache and his stiff, grey 
hair, which seemed to accentuate the obstinacy of his fore¬ 
head and to confirm the obstinacy of his chin. Motherless 
since she was three, she had grown up in the habit of looking 
to him as the pattern of probity and justice. During and 
since the war it was true that she had learnt to think for 
herself and, in disagreeing with many of his views, had 
ceased to regard him as the fountain-head of all wisdom. 
She loved him as much, even though she feared him less; 
but in the past five months, by his persistence in denying 
her the right to choose her own husband, he had severely 
tried her faith in him. 

He looked up from his letters. 

“The Vernons have asked us to dinner on Friday,” he 
said. “That will be all right, won’t it?” 

At once she saw her difficulties increased. 

“Friday ...” she answered. “I’m sorry, but . . . 
we’re going to a dance that night.” 

“Who’s ‘we’?” he demanded sharply. She knew that he 
knew perfectly well. Her “we” had been merely the open¬ 
ing move in a game which she saw would have to be 
played to its inevitable conclusion—stalemate. 

“Alan and I.” 

He gulped coffee and displayed irritation in abstracting 
an obstinate piece of toast from the rack. 

“Well, you’ll have to dance some other night.” 

“But, father, it’s a private dance and we’ve accepted. 
And the Vernons don’t really matter.” 

He turned angrily towards her. 

“On the contrary, the Vernons do matter. They’re friends 
of mine, and they matter a great deal more than this young 
what’s-his-name. And I . . 

“Alan Carnes is his name.” She caught him up brusquely, 
but then, suppressing her indignation, added half apolo¬ 
getically: 

“I didn’t mean to be rude about the Vernons, father. I 
only meant that we often go there, and I’m sure that, if 


CHRISTINE 


5 

you explained, they would ask us next week instead. Tues¬ 
day would do.” She paused for a second before beginning 
an intentionally malicious explanation. 

“I’m free that night because Alan ...” 

But the general slapped the table with his folded Times. 

“Do you think that I'm going to ask Mrs. Vernon to 
alter her arrangements to suit your convenience?” he 
demanded. “Do you imagine ...” 

She was aware that interruption was useless and would 
certainly aggravate him further. Nevertheless she inter¬ 
rupted him. 

“I’ll ask her, if you’d prefer it,” she offered. Her manner 
was polite, but it was manifestly her intention to be im¬ 
pertinent. 

“You’ll do nothing of the sort. This confounded affair of 
yours seems to have turned your head—or perhaps it is that 
association with this fellow Carnes has deprived you of 
your sense of what’s decent behaviour and what isn’t. It’s 
bad enough to have you tearing off day after day and 
neglecting the house and everything else—you haven’t 
even time to see that the mustard pot is filled—but now, 
upon my soul, you seem to expect the entire universe to 
adapt itself to your wishes.” 

“No, I don’t, father,” she protested. “I’m sure Mrs. Ver¬ 
non would understand. Still, if you’d rather, I’ll just write 
a line and say that I’m booked for that night.” 

“Why can’t you do what I ask you for once in a way?” 

She noticed with satisfaction that he gave her no order 
to attend the dinner. Time was when he had issued his 
orders to her in much the same way as he had been wont 
to issue them to his batteries. But her four years of inde¬ 
pendence away from him during the war had won her a 
certain freedom of action. Nowadays he did not lightly 
risk her defiance of him. 

“No,” she answered firmly, “I can’t do that. You can 
go alone if you like. But it’s not fair to ask me to give up 
this dance. And it wouldn’t be fair to Alan either. It’s 
being given by friends of his.” 


6 


THE BURDEN 


“I decline to consider Carnes in this matter—or in any 
matter, if it comes to that.” 

“I know. But you might consider me a little.” 

“Consider you! My God! I’ve done nothing else all 
your life. I’ve done everything in my power to make you 
happy and to give you a good time. I’ve denied you nothing 
within reason, and IVe grudged you nothing— nothing. And 
yet when it comes to an absolutely vital matter like this 
you entirely disregard both my advice and my wishes.” 

Purposely she affected to misunderstand him. 

“But you surely don’t consider dining with the Vernons 
an absolutely vital matter, do you?” she asked. 

“I don’t mean that—and you know I don’t,” he retorted. 
“I mean the question of your engagement to young Carnes.” 

Her weary sigh and the slight movement of her shoul¬ 
ders were meant to be irritating. 

“Oh, father, don’t let’s go over all that again! What’s 
the good? I’m sorry you can’t see it as I do. But I must 
consider myself first in this. It’s my life that’s concerned, 
you see.” 

“Exactly. And you’re setting out to ruin it. Why in 
God’s name can’t you listen to reason, Christine? This 
fellow is not the man for you. Do you think that at my 
age and with my experience I can’t sum him up? He 
may have a certain amount of money and he may be going 
to have a lot more. I dare say he’s got brains of a sort, 
and he may seem very devoted to you. But he’s a Radical; 
he’s stuffed full of the most pernicious notions, which he 
doesn’t know how to keep to himself ...” 

“I agree with lots of them,” she interposed hotly. 

“More shame to you, that’s all. But there are other 
things besides. He’s not of our breeding. No, it’s no use 
your sniffing angrily like that. I know what I’m talking 
about. He’s been to Oxford, you’ll say. All sorts of people 
get to Oxford nowadays. He had a commission in the war: 
so did our butcher’s son, I believe. The fact remains that 
his father is simply a house agent on a big scale. He’s 
thoroughly common. I’ve had to interview him, and I 


CHRISTINE 7 

know. It’s not good enough, Chris. We’ve got a name 
that counts, and we’ve got to respect it.” 

She had heard it all before, not once or twice, but almost 
daily, in practically the same words, for weeks and weeks. 
Usually she was patient and submissive, but to-day her 
resentment overcame her. She stood up, flushed and in¬ 
dignant. 

“I don’t care who or what his father is!” she exclaimed, 
with her brown eyes fixed defiantly on his grey ones. “I’m 
not going to marry his father. I’m going to marry Alan— 
not his relations, or his business, or his name, but him— 
him. Do you understand? I’m going to marry him because 
I love him. And I love him for what he is, not for what 
he does or owns. You’re not only being unreasonable over 
this, father; you’re being cruel, too. You ask why I can’t 
see reason. It’s not I, but you, who can’t see it. Why can’t 
you understand that I am the only person who can possibly 
decide whom I want to marry? And why can’t you realise 
that this isn’t a passing infatuation, but a solid, lasting 
thing? Do you think I could have endured all this persecu¬ 
tion otherwise?” 

“Persecution! You’ve no right to use such a word.” 

“I have; and I will use it. It’s true. It is persecuting 
me to behave as you are behaving. To refuse to see Alan 
or to let me have him to the house in spite of the fact that 
we are officially engaged; to look like thunder every time 
I mention his name or get a letter from him; to show 
your resentment of my going out with him as you do; 
to talk insultingly about him, calling him common, and 
a waster and selfish, when you’ve seen him scarcely a 
dozen times; to do everything you possibly can, day in and 
day out, to make me feel miserable when I could be so 
wildly happy — that’s what I mean by persecution, and 
that’s what you’re doing. But it’s useless, let me tell you. 
You think that you’ll wear me out and that in the end 
I’ll give him up. But I never will, never!” 

She was standing close to the table, looking down upon 
him. But her shoulders were very square and her body 


THE BURDEN 


8 

was very erect. She had lost her temper, but not her dig¬ 
nity. For a moment he did not answer, but kept his eyes 
upon her. Then she saw his features soften and felt his 
hand close upon one of hers, which rested on the edge of 
the table. She knew from experience that he was going 
to appeal to their mutual fondness for each other. It was a 
recognised move: first bluster, then anger, then an appeal. 
She had been through it all before so many times, and she 
knew that his appeal was the most difficult to face. She 
hardened her heart and waited for him to speak. 

“Chris, Chris,” he said gently, “I don’t mean to be cruel, 
God knows. But you’re all I’ve got left, you know, and 
I’m desperately proud of you. It will break me if you 
marry this man. You don’t want to see me—finished?” 

Resolutely she hardened her heart. But, oh, it was diffi¬ 
cult, this! He seemed to age before her eyes, and she 
saw him not as an angry and unreasonable tyrant, but as 
just an unhappy and careworn old man. Never before had 
she thought of her father as old; yet now he looked sixty- 
five instead of the fifty-three that she knew him to be. 
She felt her anger against him subsiding. She wanted to 
comfort him, to tell him that he need not worry any more. 
Almost she was ready to give way to him. Over any other 
question she would certainly have given way. But not in 
this—never in this. The happiness of two lives depended 
upon her steadfastness. She hardened her heart and braced 
herself to treat his appeal as of quite minor importance. 

“Nonsense, father,” she replied coolly. “You w T on’t be 
broken or finished. You’ll be happy because you’ll see that 
I’m happy. Oh, do be more sensible and less jealous! 
There’s no need to be jealous, really there isn’t. I don’t 
love you any the less because I’m going to marry Alan.” 

He withdrew his hand from hers. 

“There’s no question of jealousy,” he asserted—wrongly, 
as she very well knew. “If you were engaged to a man 
worthy of you I should be pleased enough. But this man! 
I dislike him and, what’s more, I distrust him. And so will 
you some day, when it’s too late. You’re my daughter and 


CHRISTINE 9 

a Helyar, in spite of yourself. I know you better than you 
know yourself, my child.” 

She stamped an angry foot. 

“Oh, don’t use that exasperating phrase!” she cried in 
irritation. “You don’t know me better than I know myself. 
Nobody does, or could. Not even Alan. And I’m not a 
child. I’m twenty-five and I’ve knocked about a bit. While 
you were in France I was in London—remember that. I’ve 
learnt enough about life to know my own mind and to 
make my own judgments. I’m not going to change. You seem 
to look upon me still as a sentimental schoolgirl of sixteen. 
But I’m not blindly in love with an impossibly perfect 
Prince Charming out of a fairy book. I’m sensibly in love 
with an honest, straight man. I know Alan isn’t perfect. 
Who is? But I love him for his faults just as much as for 
his good points. I’ve gone into this with my eyes open— 
yes, wide open. And, in spite of all you’ve done, I’m . . . 
I’m happy.” 

“Happy! I suppose so, yes—now. You don’t give a 
thought to me. Nothing matters to you so long as you can 
slip off to your ‘honest, straight man.’ ” He looked at his 
watch. “I’m ten minutes behindhand now—and all through 
you. It will take me half the morning to get settled down 
to my work. You, I’ve no doubt, are so wrapped up in 
your own doing and in him that you can dismiss this sort 
of thing from your mind easily enough. But I can’t. It 
upsets me. I hate it. I hate the whole damned business.” 

He picked up his letters and the newspaper. “Now say 
no more about it, for God’s sake!” he commanded. 

But she stood between him and the door. 

“I’m sorry, father, if I was rude,” she said penitently. 

“But not sorry enough, I imagine, to do what I ask you 
on Friday instead of what he wants.” 

Behind the bitterness in his tone, she was aware that he 
was putting a tentative question to her. She saw his aim. 
He was offering an armistice—but on his own terms. He 
wanted to leave the room as the winner of a definite point 
in this endless contest. Momentarily she was inclined to 


THE BURDEN 


10 

yield. After all, the dance was not of such vast importance; 
and she knew that by giving way she would obtain respite. 
But she remembered Alan’s very sensible comment on the 
situation. 

“Every time you give in to him you make the future 
harder for yourself. Every time you show firmness you 
make it easier.” 

And that, she felt—indeed, she knew from experience— 
was quite certainly true. 

“No, father,” she answered him. “I’ve promised, and 
I’m not going back on what I’ve said.” 

He walked out of the room without looking at her and 
without another word. 

She stood over the fire for a minute or two with her 
elbow on the mantelpiece and her head resting rather wearily 
on her hand. She tapped her brogue-shod foot on the fender 
and sighed. It was all so wearying and so entirely unneces¬ 
sary. Dispute, nothing but dispute, day after day, week 
after week. When would he realise that she was irre¬ 
vocably determined? Would anything short of a fait accom¬ 
pli convince him? Sometimes she was inclined to think 
that it would end in that: in their appearing before him 
and stating bluntly, “We couldn’t stand it any longer. 
We’re married. Do your worst.” But she recoiled from 
that as a solution. She was prepared for it if no other were 
possible. But not yet, not yet. She wanted her father’s 
blessing. She wanted him to see Alan as she herself saw 
him—as an honest, straight man, a man of big ideas, who 
was going to do big things. She wanted the two beings 
whom she loved best in the world to understand and appre¬ 
ciate each other. She dreaded her father’s curse. Time, 
only give him time, she kept declaring both to herself and 
to Alan, and he will come round. He’s fond of me, and he 
thinks he’s doing his best for me. He doesn’t realise how 
cruel he is. But meanwhile—oh, it’s so exhausting! . . . 

She realised that the parlourmaid was clearing away 
breakfast and that she would have to hurry if she was to 
be in time for her appointment at the golf club. With her 


CHRISTINE 


11 


back to the servant, she dabbed her wet eyes and then 
walked briskly out of the room. On her way to the links 
she rang up Alan from a public call-office. To have used 
the telephone in the house for such a purpose would have 
brought fresh trouble. In the stuffy atmosphere of the post 
office box she recounted the main features of the morning’s 
“scene.” His comforting voice soothed her. 

“Poor darling!” said the voice. “It’s worse for you than 
for me, I know. But don’t worry. It’s only for a little 
while longer, remember. And all this will make things even 
more wonderful afterwards. Don’t forget we’re having din¬ 
ner together to-night. Seven-thirty; don’t be late. Bless 
you, my Chris.” 

She walked on to the club house. Her despondent mood 
had passed, as it always did when he had reassured her. 
The sun shone, the air was crisp and fresh. Undoubtedly 
the world was a better and a more cheerful place than she 
would have admitted half an hour earlier. Her father, she 
reflected, could do little more than storm. “Bless you, my 
Chris.” Was it not worth forty storms a week to hear that 
voice say just those words in just that particular tone? 
He was a wonderfully comforting person, her Alan, and 
amazingly patient. 


CHAPTER TWO 


DINNER party of six, consisting of four persons of 



over fifty who liked bridge and two persons of under 
thirty who did not—such were the circumstances in which 
Christine had first met Alan Carnes. 

The two persons of under thirty sat next each other 
at dinner, and discovered mutual tastes for golf and dancing. 
They also discovered a mutual dislike for a plump lady 
(unknown to either of them) who sat opposite them and, 
in the intervals of closing thin lips over large mouthfuls 
of food, talked like a Daily Mail leading article. 

“Une vieille dame sans merci” said Alan Carnes. 

Christine glanced at him and smiled appreciatively. He 
smiled back, and she realised that she liked his smile. There 
was an intelligent eagerness in his expression which pleased 
her. “He’s a vigorous person,” she thought to herself. 
She was always attracted by vigour, whether mental or 
physical. She approved of his appearance—thick, fair hair 
growing low on a good forehead, humour in the corners of 
a wide mouth, thought as well as humour in eyes that 
looked very blue in a setting of tanned skin. She approved, 
too, of his talk. He entertained her throughout a dinner 
which she had expected to be devastatingly dull. She was 
attracted by him. In the drawing-room afterwards, when 
bridge was being arranged, he made it clear that he was 
equally attracted by her. 

“But, really, I never do play,” he declared, and threw 
a quick glance at her behind the back of their hostess. His 
eyes said frankly and unmistakably: “Don’t play; let’s 


talk.” 


She entered willingly into conspiracy with him. 

“And I’m so bad that I should spoil the game,” she said. 


12 


CHRISTINE 


13 


They sat in two armchairs by the open French window, 
and summer dusk turned slowly into summer night while 
their talk ranged over subjects as diverse as tKe recon¬ 
struction of Europe and the reconstruction of the fifteenth 
hole at Mid-Surrey. He interested her. He had views on a 
variety of subjects, and he could express his views. With¬ 
out being either assertive or dogmatic, he displayed his 
enthusiasm in a way that seemed to stimulate her own enthu¬ 
siasm. They discussed books and plays and motor cars 
and jobs for women and homes for heroes; then drifted 
easily to themselves and their aspirations in a changing 
world. She told him of her three years in the corps of 
women motor drivers. 

“The Great War for Freedom did have the surprising 
result of setting some people free,” she said, “and I was 
one. If it hadn’t been for the war I should never have had 
those three years of independence in London. I learnt a lot 
in that time—so much, in fact, that I find Richmond and 
the sheltered life pretty dull.” 

She wondered at herself for telling him that. It was true 
enough; two months of the old regime as mistress of her 
father’s household, after three years “on her own” in 
London, had been long enough to give her conclusive proof 
that it was true. But hitherto, out of loyalty to her father, 
she had kept the knowledge to herself. Yet now she had 
spoken of it to this stranger. Curious! And, more curious 
still, he seemed at once to understand her. 

“You’re not the sort of person who’d be content with 
the sheltered life,” he said. “At any rate, not after you’d 
once experienced any other. You’ve got wide interests.” 

“I want to have, any way,” she declared. “But I’ve 
got more chance now than I would have had. I oughtn’t 
to grumble.” 

She learnt that he had qualified as an architect just before 
the war and had then served, first in France and later in 
the East, until after the armistice. Of the war he said: 

“We had to go through with it, of course. But the 
results aren’t quite up to expectations, are they? I was 


THE BURDEN 


14 

full of zeal at the beginning, but, by Jove, I did hate it 
and everything to do with it before the end!” 

“You lost some illusions, too, then?” His view was very 
much her view, she had discovered, and so she was pleased. 

He nodded. “And you?” 

“I was in England. The home front, as they called it, 
wasn’t an entirely noble affair, not if one observed it closely 
—and I did. I got—sickened.” 

“But it’s no use looking back and it’s no use being bitter. 
The future is what really matters.” 

They talked of the future with impersonal seriouness 
for some time. But she wanted to know more about him. 

“And what are you yourself going to do?” she asked. 

“I? Oh, I’m lucky enough to have got a job. I’m in my 
father’s business—Carnes, Rutler and Carnes, Estate Agents, 
etc. Not exactly a trade, you know, but scarcely genteel 
enough to be called a profession. We’re builders as well.” 

“And you do the designs, I suppose? It must be good 
to feel that you are constructing something instead of 
destroying.” She noticed his hands—large, but shapely 
and competent; the sort of hands, she thought, which 
would be able to manipulate a hammer gently or a pencil 
boldly. “Constructing something!” she thought. 

“I’m interested in the housing problem,” he told her. “I’m 
trying to persuade my father to experiment with a model 
village.” 

She wanted him to tell her more, but he laughed and 
declined. 

“You’re encouraging me to talk shop,” he said. “Some 
other time, perhaps.” 

She inferred that he meant to see her again, and she 
was pleased. She did not wish this chance acquaintance¬ 
ship to lapse. At the end of a two hours’ talk she felt 
that she had known this man for a year. 

She went home and thought about him. She described 
him to herself as “refreshingly sane,” by which she meant 
that his views agreeably resembled her own and, incident¬ 
ally, contrasted strongly with those of her father. Her 


CHRISTINE 


15 

father had emerged from retirement as a colonel in 1914 
ard had returned to it early in 1919 as a brigadier-general, 
with two complete rows of medal ribbons to prove that he 
had vastly enhanced his reputation as an artillery com¬ 
mander. The war had aged but had not altered him. For 
him the vision of a civilisation dissolving in chaos had been 
obscured by his interest in problems of ballistics. He was 
of those who say: " Man is a fighting animal: therefore there 
win always be wars. 5 * Already he had begun the compila¬ 
tion of an abstruse treatise on The Development of Artil¬ 
lery in the Future.” 

But the war had altered Christine. Before it she had 
lived under the domination of her father, who had applied 
to the upbringing of his motherless child the same methods 
which had proved successful in the training of his batteries. 
During the war, however, while her father was learning a 
great deal a bovst barrages. Christine, in her capacity of 
chauffeur to those whom the War Office delighted to trans¬ 
port, was learning a little about life. She had discovered, 
for instance, that young men could be impertinent and 
that old men could be nice in a very nasty way. Thus she 
had learnt self-reliance. Contact on terms of social equality 
with persons of all classes, in her garage and elsewhere, had 
given her an insight—not very deep, perhaps, but, never¬ 
theless. enlightening—into “the social problem.” Her awak¬ 
ened intelligence had been confronted with new and star¬ 
tling phenomena, and in the absence of her father, whose 
saews on ail subjects she had previously regarded as informa¬ 
tion passed directly on to her from God, she began to think 
for herself. Realities, as she came to see them, clashed with 
her ideals; and though she held to her ideals she lost many 
of her illusions. Thus it was that her father, whose ortho¬ 
doxy was beyond question, was alarmed to find, on his 
return home after the war, that his hitherto amenable daugh¬ 
ter had developed opinions of her own which were almost 
heretical. Thus it was that she found Alan Carnes “refresh¬ 
ing!y sane.” 

He arrived at Boldre House in a high-powered two- 


THE BURDEN 


16 

seated car on the following Sunday afternoon, and he stayed 
a long time. He pleased the general by commenting intel¬ 
ligently on the architectural dignity of the Georgian house. 

“Why can’t we build such houses nowadays?” demanded 
the general, who was always ready to criticise the twentieth 
century in everything except in its propensity for staging 
wars. 

“They’d be out of character even if we could, don’t you 
think?” suggested Carnes. “The character of a period 
shows up more in its style of building than in anything. At 
least, that’s what I always feel.” 

“And this isn’t exactly a dignified age,” put in Christine. 

Discussion on the point brought them to Gothic archi¬ 
tecture in general, and to Rheims Cathedral in particular. 
Mention of the devastations of the war led them to the 
existent European situation. The general made all the 
assertions which he was accustomed to make on that con¬ 
troversial subject. Carnes disagreed with most of them, 
and said so, giving his reasons. To Christine, openly siding 
with him, they were sound reasons; but they incensed the 
general, more particularly as they were given very quietly, 
very deferentially, but very persistently. The general’s 
style in argument was loud, emphatic, and not necessarily 
logical. 

“I don’t like that fellow,” he said, when Carnes had 
gone. “Thinks too highly of his own opinions.” 

“He’s interesting.” 

“Bit of a bounder, I should say. Not off the top shelf, 
anyway.” 

“But he’s interesting,” she repeated obstinately, and 
added: “He’s asked me to play golf with him at Worples- 
don next Sunday.” 

“He’s not the sort of man I care to see you about with, 
Chris. Don’t encourage him!” 

The last three words were an abrupt command. Christine 
said nothing, but since she had decided, even before her 
return to Richmond, that abrupt commands were to be out 


CHRISTINE 17 

of date, she registered an intention to treat Alan Carnes 
precisely as she chose. 

“Test case for independence in likes and dislikes—rather 
important,” she thought. . . . 

Worplesdon provides good inland golf in an attractive 
setting of pine woods and heather. Christine, whose con¬ 
sistent steadiness had gained her a low handicap, enjoyed 
her two rounds with an opponent worthy of her. Carnes, 
it appeared, had once played for Oxford. He was out of 
practice and erratic, but she could tell from his style that 
he might be brilliant. He pleased her by his manner of 
taking the match seriously and concentrating his whole 
attention on it. Yet at lunch, though they talked eagerly 
enough, golf was scarcely mentioned. She liked him for that. 

“He’s not a fanatic about it, anyway,” she thought. 

Afterwards he took her to tea with his married sister, 
who lived near. Christine was not favourably impressed 
by the Dumaynes or by their house. The epithet “flashy” 
occurred to her mind, but she rejected it as being too strong. 
Yet . . . Laura Dumayne, fair and rather more than 
thirty, wore a dress which was too smart for a Sunday 
afternoon in the country; she chattered too persistently 
about her doings and her friends in London, and her manner 
from the moment of her greeting was familiar—as though 
she were prepared to be carelessly intimate with any one 
whom she met. The servant who brought in tea was con¬ 
spicuously instead of unobtrusively a manservant. The 
decoration and the furniture of the lounge hall were not 
in bad taste, but they were noticeable in a way in which 
they somehow should not have been noticeable. Ronny 
Dumayne himself, a thick-set man of forty, dark and with 
features that only just escaped being definitely Jewish, 
leant his broad shoulders against the mantelpiece and 
laughed at intervals with more force than occasion. His 
clothes—his emphatically country clothes—and his conver¬ 
sation suggested that, though he earned his money in the 
City, his tastes were rural. In the first ten minutes he had 
mentioned hunting, shooting, golf, and Epsom. He also 


THE BURDEN 


18 

allowed it to transpire that he was a colonel—in the Terri¬ 
torial Army. His wife sparred with him—not entirely 
amicably—on the comparative merits of life in London or 
out of it. 

“Stuck away down here, one’s out of everything,” she 
said. 

“Keeps you out of mischief and saves money,” retorted 
her husband, and laughed. His laugh was not a pleasant 
one. Christine noticed £hat his lips were thin and cruel 
and that he would soon be fat. Later he mixed cocktails 
from an array of bottles. Mrs. Dumayne drank two and 
became more emphatic in her protests against the dullness 
of a country life. She also invited Christine to lunch with 
her at her London club “the next time this old devil of 
mine lets me slip up to town for a day or two.” 

“Flashy is the word,” thought Christine, looking back 
as the car crunched over the twenty yards of meticu¬ 
lously raked gravel which formed the drive. 

“Comfortable house of its kind,” said Carnes, “but there 
are too many of ’em now round here. All the same type— 
new but meant-to-look-old, sand-cast and half-timbered, 
modern conveniences, own grounds, garage, etc.; they make 
this part of Surrey look like a railway advertisement. 
They’re specially built, you’d almost think, so that stock¬ 
brokers can refer to them as ‘my little place in the country.’ 
Ronny is a stockbroker, as a matter of fact.” 

The implication was not lost on her; evidently he had 
no great opinion of Ronny Dumayne. 

“A good enough fellow all the same,” he added, as 
though to cancel the malice of his previous statement. 
“Devoted to Laura and the kid. Likes to have his own way, 
though—and so does Laura. She has no use for the country 
and he prefers it. I’m anxious to see which of them will 
win.” 

“She will,” said Christine with conviction. “She’s the 
cleverer of the two.” 

“But it ought not to be a question of cleverness, surely, 
but of unselfishness—one way or the other.” 


CHRISTINE 19 

Interested, she forgot for the moment that they were 
talking of his sister and brother-in-law. 

“You said they both liked their own way,” she answered. 
“But women can be extraordinarily persistent, Mr. Carnes, 
and men v/ilJ sacrifice a lot for the sake of peace. That's 
going to be the sequel to this.” 

“It isn't my idea of marriage.” 

“Nor mine.” She met his glance frankly. 

They had reached the main road and were doing forty 
miles an hour towards London, He drove with the same 
air of concentrating himself on the task in hand which 
had pleased her on the golf links. His expression and his 
attitude, for all that he was leaning back motionless at 
the steering wheel, implied his possession of a quality she 
admired intensely—vigour. 

“There's a lot of sloppy sentiment talked about ‘soul¬ 
mates' an/1 so on,” he said; “but all the same, there's an 
ideal at the back of it, don't you think?” 

“Possibly, But community of interests—that's the basis.” 

“Comradeship, in other words. I'm with you there. And 
Laura and Konny aren't comrades—couldn't ever be. They 
just—rub along.” 

“Most people do.” 

“I know—and miss the biggest thing in life. Would 
you be content to rub along? I'm jolly sure you wouldn't.” 

“But it's just exactly what I am doing,” she laughed. 

“And are you content? Why, you admitted at lunch 
that you'd give anything to lead a different sort of life.” 

“I didn't say I wanted a soul-mate, though. I said I 
wanted wider Interests.” 

There was silence for a moment. 

“Tell me about this building experiment of your father's,” 
she said. 

He explained that bis firm was treating for the purchase 
of an estate of several hundred acres near Epping Forest, 
with a view to developing it as a garden city. 

“On the right lines ami for the right people, mind you,” 
he said. “These places so often degenerate into a kind of 


THE BURDEN 


20 

colony of cranks — vegetarians, minor poets, prohibitionists, 
and so on. But we mean to reserve it for the city clerk 
class. ‘Only genuine daily-breaders need apply’ sort of 
thing. Even with the Government assistance we’ll have 
to run it at a loss to start with, but we’re prepared to 
stand that. It may turn out a failure, of course. But if we 
can only get going, it may develop into something really 
big. My father is a long-sighted man and pretty shrewd. 
I’ve got him thoroughly interested at last.” 

“If this comes off it will be something of a chance for 
you, won’t it?” she askpd. 

For a second he turned his attention from the road to 
her, and she saw his face light up with an extraordinary 
eagerness. 

“It’s the chance of a lifetimel” he exclaimed. “I’d rather 
have the designing of this village than any job that could 
be offered me. It’s exactly what I want — it’s an opportu¬ 
nity to test my powers. And it’s not much use deciding on 
something for one’s life work unless one knows a little of 
one’s capabilities, is it?” 

“You’ll succeed,” she declared encouragingly. And she 
meant what she said. Somehow — perhaps simply by his 
enthusiasm — he had managed to impress her not only as a 
man who was eager to undertake ambitious work, but as 
one who would be capable of carrying it out; a man whose 
plans would be big and whose energy inexhaustible. 

When they reached Richmond he declined her invitation 
to come in. 

“I must get back,” he said. “But, look here, what about 
a beano one night this week? We’re much too desperately 
serious, you and I. Dinner and a revue, now? And dance 
afterwards. I’ll bring you home.” 

She gave a thought to her father and his expressed dislike 
of Carnes. She gave a second thought, not to her father, 
but to herself and her own wishes. She accepted. 

Three weeks later, upon the seventh occasion of their 
meeting, he asked her to marry him. Magnificently sure 


CHRISTINE 


21 

of herself, exultant in the knowledge that she loved him 
as she had always hoped to love some man—with the 
whole of her being, mentally, physically, spiritually—she 
gave her answer with unhesitating certainty. 

Their “beano night,” as he had called it, had made her 
sure. They dined extravagantly and then laughed at a 
revue which was less than usually inane. Afterwards he 
took her to a dance club and proved that skill could upon 
occasion amount to inspiration. She had been attracted to 
him at the beginning because he could be serious and was 
not afraid to “talk sensibly.” But on this particular evening 
she saw a different side of him. He could be recklessly 
gay and amusingly frivolous. He was quick to share a joke 
or make one, surprisingly quick to point out the ridiculous 
side of anything upon which their conversation touched. 
She found herself responding eagerly to his light-hearted 
mood, and told herself that he was an altogether charming 
companion. 

He drove her home to Richmond in the cool of the early 
morning, along a road that shone like polished steel in the 
moonlight. Fast, very fast, he drove her, and though she 
was tired out physically, her brain was quickened into 
activity by the rush of air under the lifted wind-screen and 
by the pleasing memories of a most delightful evening. He 
stood for a moment on the doorstep before parting from 
her. The car and they themselves, in their evening dress, 
seemed out of place, she thought, absurdly modern in this 
setting of old buildings-—the archway, the Georgian houses 
and the palace. 

“Good-night. I say, it has been fun, Christine. Let’s 
do it again—some time soon.” He looked eagerly into 
her eyes. 

Closing the door softly, she fumbled for the light in the 
hall and then glanced at herself in the mirror there. Her 
hair had been blown about by the wind. Mechanically she 
put up her hands to tidy it, and realised that her cheeks 
were flushed and that her fingers trembled. At that moment, 


THE BURDEN 


22 

at just that precise moment, as she told him afterwards, 
it came upon her that she loved him. . . . 

Now, after one more day’s golf and one more night’s 
dancing, he had suggested a long walk over Surrey hills. 
His insistence that a walk and a picnic lunch would be an 
agreeable variation from golf had made her expectant. 
She was so sure of herself that there were moments when 
she dared to be sure of him too. For it had happened 
to her—this; it was as much a matter of chance as a street 
accident, and yet as inevitable as a rising tide. Could it 
then be otherwise with him? Could it have happened to 
her and to her alone? She fought with her doubts and 
fears, reminding herself hopefully of that amazing sense 
of mutual understanding which had linked them from the 
moment of their first meeting. Between them there had 
never been diffidence; but, on the other hand, there had 
been nothing which could have been interpreted as court¬ 
ship or flirtation. Understanding had ripened swiftly into 
comradeship—that was all. Their minds had reacted each 
upon the other, now clashing as opposites in argument, 
now blending as complements in agreeable unison of thought. 
That was the mental side—mutually admitted, for had 
he not said, with his friendly smile: 

“Queer, isn’t it, how easy we find it to talk to each 
other? No, it isn’t queer really. We’ve got so much in 
common.” 

But she had become aware that for her, at least, the 
mental side was not all. She was attracted to him physically. 
Already he had induced in her an emotion so strong that 
she felt it to be potentially uncontrollable. She wanted 
him to love her. She knew herself to be passionately in 
love with him. . . . 

They had eaten their picnic lunch and were lounging 
among the heather in a patch of shade. No cloud stained 
the sky and the air was very still. On their long climb up 
from Dorking, where they had left the car, she had tried 
to make him talk of his professional ambitions by expressing 
interest in his model village scheme. But he had seemed 
reluctant. 


CHRISTINE 


23 

“Oh, I’m rather out of conceit with all that just now!” 
he had said. “Been thinking too much of other things 
lately.” 

She returned to the subject. 

“You’re not discouraged about your plans, are you? 
You mustn’t be,” she said. 

He turned on his elbow so that he was looking straight 
at her. 

“No, I’m not discouraged. But . . . something’s hap¬ 
pened . . . something disturbing.” 

“Would it be presumptuous to ask you if I can help?” 

“No, but it would be presumptuous of me to tell you.” 

He looked down and watched his own fingers crushing 
the stump of his cigarette into the dry earth. She was 
conscious that she was taking an absurd delight in the 
smoothness of the hair at the back of his head. He looked 
up at her again. 

“Presumptuous, Chris, wouldn’t it?” he repeated with 
steady eyes on hers. 

She did not speak. She who had never been shy with 
him before was desperately shy now. She wanted to appear 
casual, as though she did not understand him, as though 
this were an ordinary moment instead of the miraculous 
one she knew it to be; yet at the same time she wanted 
to cry out boldly: “Presumption! How could there be any 
such thing between you and me!” 

“But I can’t help it,” he said, as though he had taken 
a sudden resolution. “I’m an impetuous fool, perhaps. But 
I must know. Chris, do you believe in miracles? Has a 
miracle happened? Has it? Has it?” 

Barely conscious of his words, she was overwhelmingly 
conscious of him, of his arm round her shoulder, and of 
his face very close to hers. 

“Chris, my darling, listen! I love you. I’ve loved you 
from the very beginning, I think. You just—took me. I 
love you with all of me—utterly and for ever. Can you 
love me like that?” 


24 


THE BURDEN 


“I do,” she said. “Oh, Alan—like that: utterly and for 
ever!” 

He coiled an arm about her neck and pressed her mouth 
against his, kissing her as no man had ever kissed her, 
thrilling her as she had never before been thrilled. 

“Beloved, my beloved!” he said. “I didn’t dare to let 
myself believe it. But it couldn’t have been otherwise. It 
couldn’t have happened like that to me—so suddenly and 
so fiercely—and not happened to you too.” 

She opened her eyes and, leaning her head back in the 
crook of his arm, smiled up at him. 

“But that’s what I said of myself,” she told him. “That’s 
what I’ve been saying ever since you left me after that first 
night we danced—it was then that I knew, Alan dear. It 
had come upon me so soon and so ... so compellingly 
that I felt it must be the same with you. And yet . . . 
I didn’t dare let myself believe it either.” 

“But now—now we know,” he said triumphantly. He 
lifted her hand and kissed it gently. “Bless you, my very 
dear,” he whispered. . . . 

They sauntered back to a late tea in Dorking, amazed 
at their own happiness, utterly absorbed in each other. 

“And when shall we announce this miracle to an unbe¬ 
lieving, prosaic world?” he asked, just before they reached 
Richmond. 

“Say nothing till I tell you. Promise me that, Alan. It’s 
not going to be easy, this.” 

“I promise.” It thrilled her to know that she could rely 
absolutely on his promise. 

“Father will have to be . . . manipulated,” she said. 


CHAPTER THREE 


T HE general received Christine’s news with an explosive 
“Good God!” followed by a stare as incredulous as if 
she had announced that the British Army had mutinied 
en masse. Then he said, “I strongly disapprove, and I tell 
you frankly, Christine, that I shall do my very best to 
prevent your marrying this man.” 

Christine was aware that when her father said a thing 
he meant it; she foresaw that the process of “manipula¬ 
tion” was not to be an easy one. Several days elapsed, 
however, before she was able to gauge what the full strength 
of his opposition was likely to be. His counter-attack devel¬ 
oped slowly, but once launched, it proved to be skilfully 
planned, well-directed, and merciless in its persistent pres¬ 
sure. He did not forbid the engagement—to do that was 
beyond his powers. He simply did not recognise it. He 
said: 

“I absolutely refuse to have anything whatever to do 
with this. Go your own way since you choose to make 
such a fool of yourself. But do not expect either sympathy 
or encouragement or good wishes from me.” 

He declined to see Alan. “As far as I am concerned there 
is nothing for me to see him about,” he said. 

He forbade her to have him to the house. “To have 
him here would be to admit that I regard him as a suitable 
person to marry into our family,” he said, “and I admit 
no such thing. His name is not to be mentioned between 
us, you understand, Christine.” 

She would have obeyed him had he been able to hold to 
his own stipulation. For a day or so he did so, it was true; 
they talked with forced naturalness before the servants 
at meals, and sat in resentful silence when they were 
alone. But the general, being unaccustomed to suppress 

25 


THE BURDEN 


26 

his feelings, was soon incapable of doing so. The publication 
of the engagement in the newspapers was the occasion of 
his first outburst against Alan, and it was the forerunner 
of many. But fits of temper, devastating in their sudden¬ 
ness, formed only one of his methods of attack. It became 
apparent to Christine that he intended to rely chiefly upon 
incessant gloom. He contrived to make her feel that it 
was she who was guilty of making him miserable. He 
sustained so persistently his air of supporting with patience 
an almost overwhelming grievance that she could scarcely 
bear to see him. He sulked—but he sulked like a martyr. 
He emerged from his gloom only to be angry, or bitter, or 
appealing; and having appealed, or made some biting com¬ 
ment deliberately intended to wound, or stormed in fury 
at her obstinacy, he would relapse again to that impene¬ 
trable gloom. 

He was pitiless. He never relaxed his pressure for one 
moment. He was waging a war of attrition, and he showed 
plainly enough that he meant to wage it by every available 
means, however unscrupulous, until he had achieved his 
purpose. Christine braced herself to the ordeal. She knew 
that her obstinacy was her chief defence against him, just 
as she knew that her weak point was her affection for him. 
She admired him and she loved him. Never before had she 
defied him thus, and she was almost frightened at her own 
daring. But there was Alan. For him she would dare 
anything, for his sake there could be no going back. 

Alan was altogether splendid, she told herself. She had 
loved him almost from the start, impetuously, ignorantly. 
But she learnt to love him now quietly, thoughtfully, deeply; 
and she learnt to trust him and rely upon him as she had 
never trusted and relied upon any human being, even her 
father. Alan gave her faith. His calm assurance, his 
patient and unruffled way of meeting the facts of the situa¬ 
tion, made her believe, with him, that “things would come 
right in the end.” 

Trouble shared brought them together more swiftly and 
more closely than any equally shared joys would have done. 


CHRISTINE 2 7 

She adored him for the understanding quality of his sym¬ 
pathy and for his amazing patience. 

“I love you most of all because you are so kind, I think,” 
she told him more than once. 

He never abused her father. He accepted the situation 
as it was, unperturbed apparently by her recital of the 
general’s malevolent assertions about him, and persistent 
in his optimistic view that sooner or later there would be 
a change of attitude. 

“The strength of our position lies in ourselves, you 
see,” he said. “We’re bound to win, simply because we’re 
going to stick to each other.” 

“But it’s so humiliating—all this.” 

“I know—after all, we’re not naughty children. But 
it would be undignified to bluster. It’s a matter of time, 
Chris, that’s all. And never mind what he says about me. 
So long as you believe in me, nothing else matters.” 

“Believe in you! Oh, my Alan, nothing that he could 
say or do would alter that! But I’m awfully fond of him, 
you know, and I hate to see him miserable. He is miserable, 
Alan dear.” 

They were happy—happy in defiance of all that the gen¬ 
eral could do—for they were filled with delight in each 
other. Mutual attraction, swift, compelling, unaccountable, 
had brought them together, but their real courtship took 
place only now, after they were acknowledged lovers. They 
explored each other’s personalities with the eagerness of 
children exploring the contents of a cupboard full of toys. 
They were absorbed, utterly and passionately, in each 
other. 

When Carnes senior called by appointment at Boldre 
House, Christine, forewarned by Alan, absented herself. 
But within a few hours of the visit she had heard all the 
details of it from two points of view. The general said: 

“That fellow’s father was here this afternoon. Been 
abroad, he says, or he would have come sooner. Tried to 
be bluff and hearty with me. ‘We two old birds must see 


THE BURDEN 


28 

what we can fix up for the young people’ sort of attitude. 
But I made it pretty clear, I think, that that wasn’t my 
view of the matter.” 

“Oh, father, you weren’t rude to him, I do hope!” 

“I am not in the habit of being rude to a visitor in my 
own house. But he’s common, Chris, that’s what he is— 
common. Wears a tie-pin as big as a bird’s egg and refers 
to his wife as ‘the missus.’ ‘The missus and I will be 
delighted to see your gal down at Streatham any time you 
can spare her’—that’s what he said. Streatham—he lives 
at Streatham, d’you hear that? And he’s a house agent—a 
fellow who’ll supply you with a suburban villa or a town 
mansion over the counter, so to speak. He’s also a building 
contractor. Interesting—we haven’t had one in the family 
yet in all the four centuries of its history. It’s been left 
to you to bring us up to date—democratically. But I didn’t 
tell him that. I just told him that I considered the whole 
thing quite unsuitable and that the engagement was entirely 
against my wishes.” 

“And your reasons?” 

“You know my reasons. Obviously, I could not give them 
to him without being offensive. I did not choose to be offen¬ 
sive. Therefore, I simply stated my view and left it at 
that.” 

“And he? Was he content with that?” 

“He expressed regret at my attitude—that’s all. Then 
he left—thank God!” 

“You sneer at him, father. But it seems to me that he 
behaved jolly well. It was nice of him to say nothing of 
the way you’re behaving to Alan. He must feel it.” 

But the general had picked up his book. He looked at 
her over the top of his glasses. 

“I’m quite indifferent to his feelings,” he retorted. “That’s 
all I have to say on the subject, except that I do not wish 
to be troubled by him again. Kindly see to that.” 

From Alan, Christine heard a different version. 

“I didn’t want father to go,” he said. “I knew he couldn’t 
do any good—yet. But he’s a kind old thing, Chris—I know 


CHRISTINE 


29 

you’ll love him—and he wouldn’t realise what he was up 
against. He does now, though. He was disappointed, of 
course. He imagined he’d only got to go and be genial and 
everything in the garden would be lovely in about five 
minutes. I’m afraid your father made him rather angry. 
Dad is a big man in his way, you know, and in his business 
he’s accustomed to dealing on more or less intimate terms 
with lots of swagger people. He doesn’t like being kept 
at the bottom end of the room, so to speak, and treated 
with that sort of icy politeness which is—forgive me, Chris 
dear—extraordinarily insulting.” 

She nodded. “I know,” she said. “I can picture exactly 
how father spoke and looked. Oh, I’m sorry!” 

“You can’t help it. And my father is broadminded 
enough to make allowances—up to a point. But he says 
definitely that he’s not going to subject himself to that 
kind of thing again. He’ll make no further advances so 
long as I’m not recognised. It’s only natural, you know. 
He thinks a lot of me, oddly enough.” 

They were dining together in a quiet little restaurant. 
She slipped her hand into his under cover of the table¬ 
cloth. 

“Not oddly at all,” she smiled at him. “And if he 
says he won’t see me either, I shall understand.” 

“He says nothing of the kind. On the contrary, he says 
exactly what I do—that it’s jolly hard on you. He means 
to treat you just as though things were ... as they 
ought to be. He’s writing to you to-night, I believe.” 

“He’s a dear,” said Christine gratefully. . . . 

She got his letter on the following morning—a courteous, 
charming letter, expressing regret that, owing to his absence, 
he had not yet had the pleasure of welcoming her, referring 
tactfully to “the little bit of trouble that wasn’t going to 
make any difference as far as she was concerned,” asserting 
confidently that he knew in advance that she was a delight¬ 
ful person whom he would be proud to have as a daughter- 
in-law, and inviting her to come to them at Streatham for 


THE BURDEN 


30 

the next week-end. He remained hers “already affection¬ 
ately, my dear,” Robert Carnes. . . . 

There was, of course, an argument with the general over 
her acceptance of the invitation. He objected to her going, 
as, indeed, he objected, with a maddening reiteration of 
phrase, to every one of her doings which involved Alan. 
She met his objections firmly and as aggressively as she 
dared, and went. His final words to her were: 

“Perhaps it’s a good thing you are going. You may 
get an idea of the sort of people these Carnes are, and 
that may teach you sense.” 

During the day and a half which she spent at Hillcroft, 
Morden Road, Streatham, she obtained her idea of the 
Carnes family, its status, its character and its establish¬ 
ment; but her idea did not correspond exactly with the 
preconceived idea which her father, in his prejudiced way, 
had formed without ever having been to Streatham, nor 
was she taught sense within the meaning of the word as he 
applied it. But of the medley of impressions with which 
she came away on the Monday morning two stood out 
predominantly. The first was that her father was right in 
stating that she was going to marry beneath her; the second 
was that that was of no account whatever, because she 
loved Alan with the whole of her being. 

Mr. Carnes was working in his front garden when she 
arrived with Alan late on the Saturday afternoon. He 
was tall and comfortably fat, bald except for a fringe of 
fine silver hair. He was wearing a disreputably old tweed 
coat, striped flannel trousers, and carpet slippers. His face 
was round and red, and his smile of welcome a pleasant one. 

“Very pleased to meet you, my dear.” He looked at her 
with a frank inquisitiveness and added: “Alan was born 
lucky—I always said so, and now I’m sure of it. Come 
along and please mother with a sight of you.” 

Mrs. Carnes had dressed for the occasion—stiff silk 
with a high bodice, over which fell a cascade of lace clamped 
to her conspicuous bosom by a cameo brooch. She was 
plump and short; Christine had to stoop to receive her kiss. 


CHRISTINE 31 

“Well, Christine dear?” she said, and began to fuss 
over her. 

Christine was touched by the obvious friendliness with 
which she was welcomed. Here was direct evidence that 
Alan’s parents bore no resentment against her, although 
their son was being treated like a pariah by her father. 
An hour later, when she was being taken up to her room 
to dress for dinner, she was thinking of them both as 
“dears.” 

“But, of course, they’re not absolutely ...” she could 
not help admitting. “Especially Mrs. But they mean to 
be most awfully kind.” Left to herself, she glanced round 
a bedroom which impressed her more by the solidity of its 
comfort than by its taste. “Funny old thing, she is. More 
sure of her ‘h’s’ than one thinks at first. But she worships 
Alan, I can see that. And so does the old man, though he 
pretends not to. He’s jolly and intelligent, and she’s simple 
and suburban. I like them and . . . and I won’t be a 
snob. I won’t” 

With a joyous whoop Alan slid down the banisters 
behind her, and joined her in the large square hall, which 
was empty. 

“You do look jolly, Chris darling,” he declared, after 
inspecting a new and very simple blue frock. “You’ll make 
Laura envious. I suppose it would ruin the effect if I 
hugged you?” 

“Certainly it would,” she laughed. 

He touched her lips lightly with his. 

“Come on and dazzle them all, then,” he said. 

There were four other guests at dinner: the Dumaynes, 
who were staying the night; a plain girl in sea-green, whom 
Christine labelled “utterly Streatham”; and Norman Vaizey, 
a bachelor friend of Alan’s. Laura Dumayne, in a flashing 
sequin-covered dress which began late and ended early, 
greeted Christine effusively. 

“But how splendid!” she said. “You know, I thought 
Alan looked like getting into mischief that Sunday you 


32 THE BURDEN 

both came to tea with us. When’s it to be? Soon, I hope.” 

“We’ve not settled anything yet.” 

Christine smiled, but she was inwardly oppressed by the 
remembrance of an obdurate father sulking alone in Rich¬ 
mond. Moreover, Laura’s casually intimate manner grated 
upon her. 

“Well, you’ll live in London, I suppose—lucky person. 
And you’ll rescue your wretched sister-in-law from the wilds 
of Surrey sometimes, won’t you?” 

Without waiting for an answer, she rattled on about her 
own affairs. 

“Had a good day at Lingfield to-day,” she announced. 
“Ronny didn’t, though. Wouldn’t believe me when I told 
him that Max Errington had put me on to a real good 
thing. D’you know Max? Oh, you ought to! He’s the 
cheeriest thing ever. Dangerous, they say, too. I like that. 
A man’s so boring if you can just shut your eyes and trust 
him. Dad, have you forgotten the cocktails? Ronny’s just 
dying for one, I can see. ...” 

The dinner was long and solid, but Christine was relieved 
to find less divergence in procedure from her accustomed 
normal than she had expected; Mr. Carnes’ striped flannel 
trousers had made her anxious. But Mr. Carnes now wore 
a respectable dinner jacket suit, and Mrs. Carnes was 
encased in a dark blue velvet garment which could be 
passed as evening dress. Christine sat on her host’s right, 
with Norman Vaizey on her other side and the Streatham 
girl opposite her. The Streatham girl ate with exaggerated 
daintiness, sipped her champagne as though it were dan¬ 
gerous, and spoke nervously in agreement with whatever 
was said to her. Mr. Carnes was jovially hearty. When he 
had carved for every one, he settled to his own food with 
the air of a man who, having earned it, meant to enjoy 
it. He pressed second helpings on his guests. 

“Let me find you a tasty bit, now,” was his persuasive 
formula. He saw to it that glasses were kept filled, and 
proved his kindliness of heart by admiring an abnormally 


CHRISTINE 33 

ugly bracelet which encircled the pink wrist of the Streat- 
ham girl. 

Christine watched and listened. Ronny Dumayne, whose 
glass, she noted, was frequently replenished, called Mrs. 
Carnes ‘mater,’ and treated her almost condescendingly. 
In his chaff with Alan about the heavy responsibilities of 
married life he appeared to be launching a dart or two 
at Laura, sitting opposite him and chattering irresponsibly 
to Norman Vaizey. 

“It’s chaff, of course,” thought Christine, “but it’s just 
so worded that it’s in bad taste.” She was confirmed in her 
first impression of the Dumaynes. She disliked them both. 
But she liked Norman Vaizey, a sharp-featured little man 
of thirty-five or so, with thinning brown hair and observant, 
protruding eyes behind his pince-nez. She took to him at 
once, because he was nice to her about Alan. 

“We served together in France, you know,” he said, 
“and I’ve seen a good deal of him since. He thinks big— 
if you know what I mean. He’s got a constructive brain, 
and it will take him a long way if he gets his chance.” 

Christine glanced across the table. Alan was being politely 
pleasant to the Streatham girl, but his eyes turned towards 
Christine at once, as though he had known she was looking 
at him. He smiled happily at her—the intimate lover’s smile 
that always thrilled her. 

“Norman’s giving away all my wicked past, I suppose?” 
he said, and laughed. 

“And shocking me horribly—that’s it, Alan.” She turned 
again to Vaizey. “He’s going to get his chance,” she said, 
“with this housing scheme. You’ve heard of the proposed 
model village, I expect.” 

Vaizey had heard of it. They began to discuss its feasi¬ 
bility, and drew Mr. Carnes into their conversation. 

“Commercial philanthropy, isn’t it, Mr. Carnes?” sug¬ 
gested Vaizey. 

The old man smiled and shook his head. “There’s not 
much philanthropy about it,” he answered. “I’m being 
badgered by my reckless young son to risk a gamble— 


THE BURDEN 


34 

that’s more like it. True enough, the nation wants and 
must have houses. And sooner or later the nation will 
get them—that’s certain. But a business man like myself 
isn’t going to provide houses for nothing—that’s equally 
certain. If I risk a lot of money, I only do so for the 
chance of making a lot. I’m speculating, that’s what it 
comes to.” 

“Hark at him!” broke in Alan. “To hear him talk you’d 
think he regards this proposition exactly as Ronny here 
regards a deal in oils. Don’t you believe him, Chris. He’s 
brimful of theories of how to solve the housing problem. 
This is to be one of his experiments—and it was his idea 
originally, not mine. He’s desperately keen on it, really— 
isn’t he, mother?” 

Mrs. Carnes, thus appealed to, laid down her spoon and 
fork and finished her mouthful. Then she said: 

“I should hope so. Everybody ought to have nice homes, 
dear.” 

“Well, everybody can’t, any way,” said Ronny bluntly. 

“It’s going to be the question in domestic politics for 
the next ten years,” Alan declared emphatically. 

“Oh, bother politics!” said Laura. 

“They’ll bother us, I expect; and go on bothering us 
till this question is settled,” Vaizey prophesied. 

“Tell me your view of it, Mr. Carnes,” said Christine. 

Mr. Carnes gave his views. They were, primarily, those 
of a practical man of affairs who had won his position in 
the world by foresight, enterprise and hard work, and 
who did not wish to lose that position through the advent 
of any social upheaval. He feared an upheaval, and said so. 

“I hate to see a pack o’ fools holding down the safety 
valve,” he said. 

He was an advocate of progress—ordered progress 
planned on carefully thought out lines, “not in the slap-dash, 
bust-it-all-up-and-see-what-happens style,” he informed her. 
People would not put up with things for ever; better to 
ameliorate conditions gradually and sensibly than to wait 
until violence happened—that was his opinion. 


CHRISTINE 


35 

“And there’s no sounder way to get an all-round improve¬ 
ment than by starting with houses,” he declared. “I know 
about houses—been dealing in ’em all my life. I know how 
they can affect people. You can’t expect a man to think 
decent unless he lives decent. That’s common sense, that 
is. And I want people to think decent. It’s safer; not just 
for us comfortably-off folk—I don’t mean that—but for 
the country as a whole—the world for that matter. See my 
point?” 

He enlarged upon the matter. He ceased to be the prac¬ 
tical business man and became a theorist, elucidating his 
ideas on the possibilities of the future with what seemed 
to Christine a remarkable breadth of vision. She saw that he 
was essentially a kindly man with wide sympathies, a man 
whom prosperity had not afflicted with the blight of its 
selfishness. She forgot that he was vulgar, forgot it even 
when he picked his teeth with practised dexterity. 

In the drawing-room afterwards Laura tried to draw her 
on the subject of the engagement. 

“So sorry to hear that things aren’t going smoothly,” 
she whispered to Christine as soon as Mrs. Carnes was 
engrossed in a discussion of servants with the Streatham 
girl. “But don’t you worry, my dear. Parents always come 
to heel in the end if they’re treated right. But Alan’s rather 
a proud person, you know. You mustn’t let him in for too 
many rebuffs.” 

“Quite so.” Christine’s tone was cold. She resented 
comment on Alan or on their affairs from this flashy 
woman, with her long amber cigarette holder and her over¬ 
manicured hands. It was hard to remember that this was 
Alan’s sister. 

Mrs. Carnes initiated a discussion on domestic ways and 
means. Christine joined in. A comparison of the prices of 
vegetables in Streatham with those in Richmond was not 
exhilarating, but it was preferable to an exchange of confi¬ 
dences with Laura. Christine helped to protract the dis¬ 
cussion until the arrival of the men. Mrs. Carnes, evidently 


THE BURDEN 


36 

impressed by her knowledge, patted her hand affectionately 
and beamed upon her. 

“You’re a very good housekeeper, my dear, that’s plain,” 
she declared. “And it’s more important than young people 
think sometimes.” 

Laura yawned behind her elegant hand. 

Later, on Alan’s suggestion, there was dancing. Mr. 
Carnes was assiduous in his superintendence of the gramo¬ 
phone, and Mrs. Carnes played Patience in a corner. With 
unselfish impartiality the three men exchanged partners 
on each occasion that Mr. Carnes changed the record on 
the gramophone. 

“Well, darling,” whispered Alan into Christine’s ear 
when eventually they were dancing together. “Well, and 
how goes it?” 

“It goes very well. Am I behaving, Alan?” 

“Behaving? Why, you’ve captured them, Chris! But I 
knew you would. Mother says you’re a treasure, and Dad 
—oh! I knew by the way Dad was talking to you at dinner 
that he’s taken an enormous fancy to you. He only lets 
himself go on his pet subject with people he really likes.” 

“They’re both perfect dears, and ever so kind, especially 
if one remembers the situation—you know what I mean.” 

He steered her through the open window on to the veran¬ 
dah, and took her into the garden. Then he put his arms 
round her and held her very closd to him. 

“My Chris!” he said softly. “You don’t begin to know 
yet how much you mean to me and how desperately proud 
of you I am. But perhaps I’ll be able to show you— 
some day.” 

“I know more than you think,” she answered. “And 
oh, Alan, I do trust you so completely!” 

She responded to his kiss, twining her bare arms round 
his neck and pressing her parted lips against his. Plainly 
enough, and without reticence or false shame, she showed 
her passion for him. They clung to each other for a delirious 
moment. And then he loosed her. 


CHRISTINE 37 

“We must go back,” he said abruptly. She felt a little 
dizzy. . . . 

Mr. Carnes, arrayed in morning coat, top hat and black 
satin four-in-hand tie, took Mrs. Carnes, rustling in grey 
taffeta, to church. Alan and Christine lounged in two 
deck chairs in the garden and spent a happy morning map¬ 
ping out a marvelous future for themselves. They would 
live in London, they decided, and they would so plan 
their lives that not a moment was wasted and not an oppor¬ 
tunity missed. 

“I want to live with all my faculties all the time,” was 
Christine’s ambition. 

“No grooves!” said Alan. “And it’s so jolly easy to slip 
into grooves.” 

“But we won’t let ourselves, Alan. We’ll make sure that 
we’ve got lots of interests—work interests and play inter¬ 
ests. We’ve both got an abundance of the thing that counts 
most when it’s a question of how much one can get out 
of life.” 

“What’s that, you most intriguing person?” 

“Energy—physical and mental. Vigour—don’t you 
agree?” 

His fingers, idly stroking her arm, closed round it. 

“Yes,” he said. “Chris, don’t you feel that we were 
drawn to each other from the very beginning because of 
that? I do. I love to see a person go enthusiastically at a 
thing, whether it’s a job of work, or a game of golf, or a 
war, or a pillow fight—anything. I hate what I call the 
'droopy’ attitude. So do you. I knew you did at once when 
I first met you.” 

“The same with me. And ... I say, here we are 
agreeing that we are two of the cleverest and most energetic 
people on earth, and yet we’re sitting here loafing through 
the morning.” She laughed gaily. 

“We’re not loafing,” he protested. “We’re busy planning 
an incredibly active life. And I like stroking your arm 
and looking at your rather jolly ankles. However, come 


THE BURDEN 


38 

on, and I’ll show you all over the house and give you a 
lecture on modern domestic architecture.” 

He took her round, explaining the general principles of 
design to her as he went and pointing out how they had 
been applied in the particular case of his own home. His 
father, so she learnt, had built the house some years before 
the war, and was vastly proud of it. Alan was critical. 

“It was pretty good of its kind then,” he said, “but 
we’ve learnt a lot since. Dad would never admit it, of 
course, but if he was going to build another it would be a 
big improvement on this.” 

“He’d let you design it, perhaps?” 

“The architect who did this one led the very devil of a 
life while he was doing it. Dad knew too much. He went 
into every minute detail and argued every blessed point. 
No, I’m not sure that I’d like to design a house for Dad. 
But, anyway, I won’t get the chance. This is his last home, 
he says.” 

“Will he give you a free hand with the model village?” 

“If and when we take it on—yes, more or less, I think. 
He isn’t going to live there, you see. Besides, there will be 
scope for variety there. It’s not one house, but dozens. 
One can experiment, try all sorts of ideas. By Jove! I do 
hope . . . it’s such a chance, Chris.” 

They were alone in the library—“the best-proportioned 
and the best-furnished room in the house,” he had told her. 
She took hold of the lapels of his coat and stood close to 
him with her steady brown eyes fixed on his. 

“You’re going to get the chance,” she said confidently, 
“and you’re going to take it. I believe in you, Alan, dearest. 
You’re going to do big things.” 

He put his hands up and covered hers. 

“For you, darling—and with your help.” 

“For yourself—that means for me, too. I’ll help, yes, 
if loving you and taking pains to understand you help. 
But you’re not to let your love for me be a hindrance. It 
could be, you know. No, don’t shake your head and protest 


CHRISTINE 39 

prettily. I’m serious, ever so serious. Your work has got 
to be the great thing in your life.” 

“That’s what I thought—till you appeared. But now you 
are, and always will be. But you—don’t you see, Chris, 
darling?—you won’t lessen my ambitions. You’ll increase 
them, and you’ll be giving me encouragement to fulfil them 
all the time. You don’t know yourself if you think you’re 
the sort of person who’ll lure me away from my job—I 
should never have loved you if you’d been like that. I’m 
not in the dilemma of having to choose between you and 
my work; and I never shall be—you being what you are. 
One’s mind isn’t like a tank—fill it with thoughts of Chris¬ 
tine and there’s no room for ideas on house building! One’s 
mind is a stream, rather ...” 

“And I’m a tributary to yours, I suppose?” she laughed. 

“If you like—making it flow faster. Regular torrent of 
ideas pouring through my head since ...” 

“Since when?” 

“Since that day when you were so reckless as to say 
that you’d marry me, bless you!” 

He was smiling and pretending not to take her seriously. 
But she knew that he understood. She knew it for certain 
when he said suddenly: 

“You’re right. It’s an enormous asset to have one’s heart 
in one’s job. And mine is. Chris, you are a splendid person. 
You go to the root of things. You—understand.” 

He grasped her hand as though she were a man—a pal 
who had done him a good turn. 

“Friend!” he said. 

“Helpmate—I want to be,” she answered. 

They sat up late that Sunday night. They had been for a 
long walk, and had come home in time for supper healthily 
tired and inordinately happy. They had talked and talked of 
any and every subject that came into their heads. They 
had been earnest and frivolous and critical and enthusiastic 
and sentimental by turns. They had agreed and disagreed, 
disputed without rancour, chaffed each other with light- 


40 


THE BURDEN 


hearted laughter, and found unceasing pleasure in each 
other’s society. He had said: 

“You do delight me—because you’re always ready to 
talk about any subject. And you say what you really think. 
I love you for that.” 

Old Carnes and Mrs. Carnes made their excuses and went 
to bed at ten-thirty. 

“We like to be early of a Sunday,” said Mrs. Carnes, “and 
I expect you two can do very well without us.” 

“They’ve only had about nine hours’ talk to-day,” 
laughed the old man. “Good-night, my dear. And don’t 
you fret about things. No need for it, believe me. We’ll 
see you through, mother and I.” 

It was the only allusion he had made throughout her 
stay to the “trouble” which was casting its chilling shadow 
upon the warmth of her happiness. She was grateful to 
him—firstly, for having said so little and so for having 
spared her from embarrassment, and, secondly, for having 
shown, both by his acceptance of her and by those few 
words of encouragement, that he knew her difficulties. 

They sat together on the sofa in the drawing-room, 
Christine leaning comfortably back against Alan’s encircling 
arm with her head resting on his shoulder. She was tired, 
but her very tiredness enhanced her sense of the intimacy 
of sitting there alone with him while the household slept. 
He stroked her arm; very gently his fingers moved over 
her bare skin from elbow to wrist and back again. She 
closed her eyes and was soothed by the pleasure of his 
touch. His touch, she had often told him, was as tender 
as a woman’s, and yet to her thrilling as no woman’s could 
be; a lover’s touch. 

“Chris,” he said presently, “do you think much about 
the passionate side of our love for each other? Do you 
ever try to imagine just what place that is going to take 
in our lives?” 

“Yes,” she answered quietly, “often. You see, I’m not 
ignorant, Alan dear. I know things. I know how sordid 
sex can become. There’s evidence enough of that on every 


CHRISTINE 


41 

side, isn’t there? I passed through a phase once, I remem¬ 
ber, immediately after I became aware of ‘the facts of life’— 
that silly phrase—when I was disgusted, repelled rather, by 
the very thought of it. But then, somehow, that passed. 
I became something of an idealist; it’s hard to express, but 
I mean I came to feel certain that it could be made very, 
very wonderful—all that. Holy, almost—no, altogether 
holy, if there’s love, real love.” 

“There is—between you and me,” he whispered. 

“I know there is. Oh, my dear, I can be frank with you. 
You’ve stirred me—more than you realise, perhaps. It 
hasn’t ever happened before; not like this, any way. You’ve 
made me want you. But more than that; you’ve made me 
happy in the thought that some day I shall be able to give 
you my most precious possession—what no one else has 
ever had or will ever have.” 

His arm tightened round her and his fingers gripped her 
hand hard. 

“There’s something I want . . .I’ve got ... to tell 
you,” he said. “With me . . . it’s been . . . different. 

“Different, do you understand?” he went on. “You say 
you know things. Then I expect you’ve guessed—about 
me; that I can’t come to you as you will come to me. But 
I wanted you to hear it definitely from my own lips. I’ve 
always meant to tell you. But it wasn’t easy, darling. I 
love you so much and so deeply that I’m finding it desper¬ 
ately hard to say to you, ‘With me there have been—others.’ 
. . . But it is so.” 

He stopped short and moved so that he could look at 
her. 

“Chris!” he pleaded. “It sounds horrible when it’s put 
bluntly like that. But you’d guessed—you must have 
guessed. Tell me this isn’t an awful shock to you. Tell me 
you won’t let it make any difference.” 

She had known it; known it and sworn to herself that she 
would be able to discount it as having happened in the 
unimportant past when, not having known him, she had not 


42 


THE BURDEN 


loved him. But confronted with it, confronted with the 
statement emerging from his own lips, she was chilled. 

“I guessed, yes,” she answered coldly. And then almost 
savagely: “Why should it be the normal, accepted thing 
for you, a man, and the abnormal, disgraceful thing for me, 
a woman, if I had to make the same confession? Why 
should less be expected of you than of me?” 

He did not answer, but her glance at him showed her that 
he was suffering and frightened. 

“It’s the past and it’s done with,” she said. “I have no 
right to blame you, I suppose. But it hurts—it’s bound to 
hurt. I can’t explain. It’s a thing no girl could explain 
and no man could quite understand. Alan, tell me some¬ 
thing. Did you ever care—for any of these others?” 

He sat up and, turning towards her, looked straight into 
her eyes. 

“No,” he answered, “I swear I didn’t. It wasn’t love. 
I didn’t know what love could mean then. That’s why I 
had no remorse in doing—what I did. How could I tell 
then that I’d be hurting you later on? And I hate to hurt 
you, because I love you, Chris darling. I’ve never loved 
any woman but you. The other thing was—is—different, 
utterly different. You must believe me when I say that. I 
know it is so, I know it.” 

“I believe you,” she said very quietly. She knew that 
he was speaking from his heart, and she had been touched 
by his sincerity and his frankness with her. 

“We won’t ever talk of this again,” she said. “The past 
—shall not matter.” 

“Because the future’s ours—will you look at it like that, 
and trust me?” 

“I do. You know I do.” 

She drew his arms round her neck and made him hold 
her close. 

“Alan, my Alan!” There was a choke in her voice and 
her eyes were wet. “I’m all yours. 

He lowered her gently until she was lying back on the 
sofa. Then he knelt beside her and took her hands. 


CHRISTINE 


43 


“My dear, my very dear!” He bent over her till his lips 
touched her forehead. “So,” he said, “reverently—do you 
see?—that’s one way I love you, Chris. I shan’t ever for¬ 
get to-night.” 

“Nor I. But you mustn’t put me on a pedestal. I don’t 
want you to think of me like that. I want you to love me 
as I am. Don’t have illusions about me, my dear.” 

With a sudden, impulsive movement she put up her arms 
and drew his head down to her breast. 

“Kiss me now as if I belonged to you altogether,” she 
commanded. 

He obeyed her. His caresses, more fervent and more 
intimate than ever before, seemed to lift her right out of 
the world into an illimitable space where she floated uncon¬ 
scious of anything save herself and Alan. She clung to him, 
abandoning herself without reserve to the rapture of their 
mutual passion. . . . 

She opened her eyes and found him standing beside her. 
His hands were tight clenched and his breath came quickly. 

“Chris,” he said unsteadily, “it’s late, and you’d better 
go to bed. I . . . oh, darling of mine, I’m a man, I’m 
human, and I’m madly in love with you. You must go—* 
now, quickly. Do you understand?” 

She understood, and she worshipped him at that moment. 

He held the door open for her. She turned as she passed 
through. 

“Good-night, my beloved,” she said. “I understand.” 


CHAPTER FOUR 


AT the end of six months—by the beginning of the New 
ijLYear, that is to say—Christine was fully aware that 
the strain of the situation was telling on her; for the strain 
had been continuous and increasing, and she felt that her 
powers of endurance were waning under it. There were 
signs, too, which she had been quick to note, that Alan was 
not unaffected. Latterly he had been saying, once and 
again: 

“This simply can’t be allowed to go on for ever, you know, 
Chris. It’s exhausting you and it’s not fair on either of us. 
We’re wasting our lives—and to no purpose.” 

She knew that Alan was right. The life she was leading 
was exhausting her, mentally and even physically. Her 
father maintained his attitude of stern, uncompromising 
hostility, varying it only by occasional appeals to her affec¬ 
tion for him and by ferocious outbursts of temper. The 
effort to keep her temper with him, to treat him with a 
friendly cheerfulness whenever possible, and to appear at 
all times indifferent to his coldness towards her cost her 
much and told upon her even when she was away from 
him. Her nerves had become affected. She had become 
irritable. She was irritable with the servants, irritable 
with her friends, and even with her father’s friends, whose 
inquisitiveness about her engagement and its consequences 
she was unwilling to satisfy and yet unable to check. She 
was not irritable with Alan, but she was finding it increas¬ 
ingly difficult to hide her moods of depression from him. He 
could still soothe her back to cheerfulness when she came 
to him low-spirited, silent, unhappy. But more and more 
it was a question of a deliberate and almost formal effort 
on his part, producing a reluctant acquiescence on hers. In 
the end—always before they parted—she was happy again 

44 


CHRISTINE 


45 

—temporarily at all events. But she was losing her one¬ 
time confident feeling that she had only to be with him to 
rid herself of all despondency. She was losing, so she felt, 
her grip on herself and her power to look beyond the cir¬ 
cumstances of the moment to a future that was to make 
amends for everything. There were occasions when she 
was inclined to admit to herself secretly that her father 
would win in the end. She was afraid of his strength of 
purpose and of his remorseless determination. 

But there were other occasions still when her self-confi¬ 
dence and her faith in Alan overrode all her fears and all 
her anxiety; splendid, joyous moments which held rapture 
or dreams or laughter or visions made wonderful by the in¬ 
tensity of her love. Such a moment was the occasion when 
Alan was able to tell her that the “village scheme,” as they 
always called it, was decided upon. Negotiations for the 
purchase of the land—two hundred acres of it, on the out¬ 
skirts of Chingford—had been dragging on for months, 
but were now almost completed. The scheme was to all 
intents “through.” If there were no hitch—and no hitch was 
anticipated now—Alan would be at work upon the plans 
in less than a month. 

“Never mind all the financial side of it; I can explain 
that to you later. The firm’s risking a lot, but the firm 
can jolly well afford it. But the point is this,” he told her 
excitedly; “here are two hundred acres to be built upon, 
not more than five houses to the acre—and I’ve got the 
job. Dad’s given me a free hand, subject to his final ap¬ 
proval and within certain limits of cost, of course. It’s a 
whole blooming town, Chris. Eight or nine hundred houses 
—think of it!—with shops and a bank or two and an assem¬ 
bly hall, and perhaps a church. I shall be able to spread 
myself, shan’t I? Jove, what a chance! And to design the 
whole thing—to think it out first as a mass effect and then 
to go into it all in detail! To watch it grow, to see my 
own ideas actually living in brick and wood and stone! My 
village—no, our village, darling, because you’ll be the in¬ 
spiration of it all.” 


THE BURDEN 


46 

Christine caught his infectious enthusiasm. She realised 
at that moment, as never before, that his heart was in his 
work, that his work really was of tremendous import in his 
life. She rejoiced. It was what she had wished for above 
all else. 

“It’s splendid, simply splendid, Alan dearest,” she said 
eagerly. “When will you begin? How long will the plans 
take you?” 

“Oh, months, I expect! Must get everything right—per¬ 
fect. And the costing takes time. But I’ve begun already 
—in my mind. Look, this is the general idea, so to speak! ” 

He pushed aside plates and glasses and defiled the res¬ 
taurant tablecloth with a rough sketch plan of the main 
features of his model village. And while he drew he de¬ 
scribed to her how he meant to group his buildings for 
effect as well as for utility, how he intended to give space 
and yet to waste none, how he would make simplicity look 
dignified, and how he would, in the design of the whole, 
create an atmosphere that would give the place distinction. 

“Why, Alan, I can almost see the village already,” she 
declared admiringly. 

“Well, you shall see where it’s going to be, anyway,” he 
answered. “We’ll drive down there one day soon.” 

It was a fine day in early spring when she called for him 
at the office of Carnes, Rutler and Carnes, in Westminster, 
and was shown into the private room of the head of the 
firm. Old Mr. Carnes, during business hours, she was half 
surprised to find, was an entirely different person from the 
Mr. Carnes whom she had met at Streatham. He rose to 
greet her with a courtly bow. His morning coat fitted him 
beautifully, there was a flower in his button-hole, and the 
turquoise pin, “as big as a bird’s egg,” as her father had 
said, was in his tie. He was suave, almost unctuous. His 
very voice had changed to one of extreme gentility. 

“Alan will be ready in a moment,” he said. “I hope you 
are keeping well.” His telephone bell rang and she sat 
quietly by while he spoke gravely and very decisively upon 


CHRISTINE 


47 

what appeared to be some important business matter. She 
looked about her. The office was nearly luxurious, and the 
etchings—all architectural subjects—which decorated the 
walls were good ones. Then Alan came in, Alan looking 
particularly smart in a new grey suit and particularly boy¬ 
ish and eager because the sun was shining and he was about 
to take her out for a whole day in the country. He kissed 
her light-heartedly. 

“You were punctual and I wasn’t / 7 he said. “Come 
on; don’t let’s waste another moment.” 

Five minutes later his car was taking her eastwards 
along the Embankment. The dome of St. Paul’s, conspic¬ 
uous before them, was a thing of noble beauty in the spring 
sunshine. Christine settled herself comfortably. This was 
to be a happy day, unspoilt by thoughts of the trouble that 
lurked behind her up the river at Richmond. 

They traversed the East End—Commercial Road, the 
Mile End Road, Bow, Stratford and on to Walthamstow. 
Christine knew the route. During the war she had had 
occasion to drive men of commerce, unskilfully disguised 
as staff officers, to this part of the world on visits of inspec¬ 
tion to factories and warehouses. But it had not then oc¬ 
curred to her to consider the East End in terms of its hous¬ 
ing accommodation. But now she felt differently. She 
kept rather silent, glancing up the length of each mean 
street which debouched into the crowded main road. 

“I suppose there’s more squalor to the square mile here 
than anywhere else in the world,” she suggested at last. 

Alan shrugged his shoulders. 

“There’s not much to choose between London and any 
other big city, I believe. It’s a visible condemnation of our 
boasted civilisation, though, isn’t it? Makes one think a 
bit. Makes one realise that the housing question isn’t ex¬ 
actly simple. Golly, but there’s work enough to be done to 
keep our generation busy all its life.” 

“You’re beginning to do your bit, anyway.” 

He smiled. “The Chingford village! My dear, it’s—I 
won’t say a drop in the ocean, that’s such a wrong meta- 


48 


THE BURDEN 


phor—it’s like ordering one stone to be hewn when you’ve 
got a contract to build a town hall.” 

“But it’s a beginning,” she persisted. 

“It is, I agree. If we succeed in transplanting a few 
hundred city clerks and their families from deadly sur¬ 
roundings to pleasant ones and induce them to appreciate 
the change, we’ll have made a start. And, anyway, experi¬ 
ments are always interesting.” 

They spent an hour examining the site of the village. 
It was in shape roughly a pentagon, lying to the north-west 
of Chingford, with the forest on its eastern and southern 
sides. From its furthest point Chingford station was just 
over a mile distant. Alan was enthusiastic about its ad¬ 
vantages. The soil was good, the railway handy, but in 
no way obtrusive, the whole forest was available as a pleas¬ 
ure garden. ‘“And space, Chris, don’t you see? Space in 
which to move and breathe and live. Don’t you think we 
can make it attractive?” 

She was sure of it. She walked about with her arm 
through his, listening to his explanation of his general design 
and trying hard to visualise the completed whole. She felt 
excited. It was almost as though she expected that, if she 
closed her eyes for a moment, she would open them again 
to find that buildings—delightfully fashioned houses and 
shops and inns—had sprung up at his bidding to prove his 
constructive skill. 

“Alan, you must sketch it for me,” she demanded. “Not 
a plan or an elevation or anything dull and technical like 
that, but a picture of what you mean it to look like as a 
whole from a little way off.” 

“In perspective, you mean? Done from the west side 
with the forest as a background. I’ll try.” 

“Do. Because I’ve got my own idea and I want to com¬ 
pare it. See?” She pressed his linked arm against her 
side. “In my idea it’s rather beautiful, Alan. A sort 
of haven to which the little bread-winning clerk comes back 
at night. But not a restful haven exactly. A place, I 
mean more, which, by giving contrast in atmosphere, in- 


CHRISTINE 49 

duces an interest in outside things—new things; a re¬ 
vivifying sort of place. Is that fantastic ?” 

“Perhaps. But it happens to be just my aim/’ he re¬ 
plied eagerly. “One’s got to be practical, too, of course. 
But if one can blend an ideal with one’s material object, 
so to speak . . . Chris, you always understand. You’re 
just wonderful.” 

“We’re a very wonderful pair,” she declared with a happy 
laugh, “and awfully clever, too.” 

They left the car in Chingford and walked deep into 
the forest. Then, with their backs comfortably against the 
smooth grey trunk of a beech tree, they sat together and 
ate the picnic lunch which they had brought with them. 
From the distance there came to them faintly the occasional 
whir of traffic on the main road through the forest to Epping, 
by way of reminder that they were barely a dozen miles 
from London. But they had forgotten London. 

“I love trees,” said Alan. “I always want to get among 
trees at this time of year. They make me feel that spring 
really is happening again in the world. One’s apt to be 
sceptical in a city. But here . . . listen, Chris! One can 
almost hear things growing.” 

They were silent for a long and peaceful moment. Then 
Christine spoke: 

“Do you remember that wonderful passage in ‘Tess’? ‘The 
hiss and rush of sap’—that bit?” 

“No,” he admitted. “Go on, Chris.” 

“I can’t,” it was her turn to admit, “but I love it when 
I read it. Hardy does more than make me see country. He 
makes me feel it as part of human life. Know what I 
mean?” 

“Yes,” he said. “Everything in the world is a part of 
human life. Yet the average human being likes to pre¬ 
tend that he’s an isolated entity, independent of every one 
and everything but himself. Independence! It’s a dream 
—and a foolish, dangerous one too. It’s selfish and it’s 
retrogressive.” 

“Not necessarily,” she disagreed. “We’re interdependent, 


THE BURDEN 


SO 

yes, if you take the material side of it. But character, 
mind—that’s personal, surely.” 

They argued as they walked on. She loved to make him 
discuss things with her. Often, as perhaps on this occa¬ 
sion, she would take a line in opposition to his just for the 
pleasure of hearing him put his case. He was always so 
enthusiastic; he always brought such vigour into the de¬ 
bate. 

“You sharpen my wits for me. It does me good,” she 
had often told him. 

They ate plates of bread and butter and piles of water¬ 
cress in the Forest Hotel at Chingford before starting for 
home. They had been walking for over four hours, but 
she declined to admit that she was in the least tired. Nor 
was she. The fresh air, the sunshine and the exercise had 
done her good. She felt healthier and happier than she 
had done for weeks. Her troubles, those worries over the 
situation which were always lurking at the back of her 
mind ready to spring at her and heap a load of depression 
upon her, had shrunk temporarily to insignificant trifles. 

“Everything will come right in the end,” she told herself, 
and said: 

“I’ve enjoyed every tiny moment of to-day, Alan. I love 
to think that, if we choose, we can put the passionate side 
away from us for the time being and be thoroughly happy 
together simply as companions.” 

“That’s what’s going to make the other part lasting,” he 
answered her. “Still”—he glanced round the garage yard 
as he helped her into the car—“still, I do love you quite a 
lot, you know, darling; and not only as a companion for a 
walk.” 

He leant over her and kissed her shamelessly. 

“See?” he said, and smiled at her. 

“I love you to do unexpected things like that, you queer 
man,” she told him happily. 

He took her home by a different route, skirting round 
the north of London and coming in by Finchley and Hamp¬ 
stead. She telephoned to Richmond to say that she would 


CHRISTINE 


51 

not be back to dinner, and it was ten when he deposited 
her at the archway leading through to Boldre House from 
Richmond Green. 

“It’s been a perfect day,” she said, standing for a moment 
beside the car with her hand on his shoulder, “but it may 
not have a perfect end. There’ll be a row, I expect. I said 
I’d be back to dinner. But—oh, never mind! It’s been 
worth it.” 

They kissed. “Good-night, bless you,” each said. 

She saw a light in her father’s study and walked straight 
in. Better to face it at once, she thought. But to confront 
him immediately after leaving Alan was like squeezing a 
cold sponge over herself after a warm bath. She had to 
brace herself to the sudden chill of it. 

He was standing with his back to a low-burning fire when 
she entered, and he looked, as always now, forbidding and 
grim. 

“Well, father dear,” she said, and kissed his cheek. He 
let her kiss him, but he made no responsive movement of 
affection. 

“Well?” He seemed to be waiting for something. 

“I’m sorry about dinner,” she began, “but it was so late 
by the time we got back.” 

“It wouldn’t have been if you’d started home earlier. But 
you never have the slightest consideration nowadays for 
any one but yourself.” 

“Oh, father, please!” She dropped into a chair and took 
off her hat. “Don’t let’s start it all again. I’m tired.” 

She was tired. Half an hour previously, when Alan had 
bent over her in the car on the way home and asked, “Tired, 
darling?” she had been able to assure him truthfully that 
she was not. But now, after two minutes in her father’s 
presence, she was aware that lassitude had already crept 
upon her. She had entered the room determined that she 
would not allow the exhilaration which had buoyed her up 
all day to yield to depression. Yet depression was master¬ 
ing her, was positively swamping her like a rising flood from 
which there was no escape. 


52 


THE BURDEN 


“You’re not too tired to listen to me for a minute or two, 
I imagine.” The general warmed his hands behind his 
back and tapped his heels on the fender. “I’ve heard 
things to-day which I think it is right that you should 
know.” 

“Yes?” She was expecting some fresh insinuation against 
Alan. She was preparing herself to defend him haughtily, 
fiercely if need be. 

“This Mrs. Dumayne—Carnes’ sister, I understand. 
You know her, I suppose. What is your opinion of her?” 

“She’s been quite pleasant to me. Why?” Christine was 
deliberately guarded. 

“She’s fast—definitely and notoriously fast. She’s a by¬ 
word. Did you know that?” 

“I don’t believe it.” Christine would have believed 
much of Laura Dumayne, but she was unwilling to accept 
her father’s allegations. 

“Her husband is a little stock-jobbing bounder; isn’t 
that so?” 

“Ronny is on the Stock Exchange—yes.” 

“Ronny!” The general snorted in anger. “They’re at 
loggerheads. She doesn’t give a curse for him; spends 
most of her time and most of his money in gadding about 
with a fast set of people. She gambles. Her name has been 
coupled with several men already—unpleasant men. The 
latest is one Max Errington. Ever heard her mention him?” 

“Yes, once, quite casually.” She wished he would not 
shoot these questions at her. He was treating her as though 
she were an accused soldier and he her commanding of¬ 
ficer. 

“I know him—by reputation. An unscrupulous waster. 
The sort of man I detest. Never done anything worth 
doing. Cynical, unhealthy, sly—thoroughly nasty, in fact.” 

“But, father,” she protested, “supposing all this is so— 
and I decline to believe it until it’s proved—what on earth 
has it got to do with me?” 

“To do with you! You call yourself engaged to this 
woman’s brother, don’t you? You’re infatuated enough to 


CHRISTINE 


53 


want to marry him. Well, you shall realise exactly what it 
means. You’re a Helyar by breeding; you can’t get away 
from that. But you propose to allow yourself to be mixed 
up with this family, and that means in scandal and every 
sort of beastliness. I hate the thought of it. You—and all 
that! It’s vile. And, besides, if the sister’s like that, it’s 
pretty reasonable to assume that the brother’s much the 
same. It’ll be in the blood—common blood.” 

She sprang up and faced him. 

“I won’t listen!” she cried. “It’s monstrously unjust of 
you. And what do you know—for certain, I mean—about 
Laura?” 

“I know what I’ve heard, and I’ve told you It’s not just 
gossip. Good God, it’s common knowledge! Ask else¬ 
where if you don’t believe me.” 

“I shall do no such thing. I prefer to go by facts. And 
you can give me no facts. But even if every word of your 
accusations were true, it would make no difference to me.” 

She picked up her hat. 

“And I should have thought that you, with your ideas of 
honour and good form and so on,” she added, “would have 
refrained from repeating such things about an absent per¬ 
son—and a woman too—on mere hearsay. Good-night.” 

“It’s more than hearsay, I tell you!” she heard him shout 
angrily after her as she closed the door. 


CHAPTER FIVE 


HREE days later Christine met Alan for lunch. She 



A. had not seen him since their day at Epping, and the 
intervening three days had been a hell for her. 

She was twenty minutes late, and she was looking white 
and drawn. 

“Oh, anything: you choose!” she said testily when he 
held the menu before her. She stared moodily past him 
across the restaurant. Their table was too near a rackety 
orchestra and her head ached. He was talking, making 
cheerful little comments on the world in general and their 
own affairs in particular. He was ostentatiously ignoring 
her mood and trying thus to lure her back to good humour. 
He was, in fact, had he but known it, irritating her ex¬ 
ceedingly. She was scarcely even pretending to listen to 
him. She answered his questions and his remarks with a 
word or two, sometimes with no more than a nod or a shake 
of the head. She was thinking of entirely different things. 
Her father had been goading at her for three whole days, and 
his goading had left its marks upon her. Life was very 
black indeed. 

“I’ve been working like blazes since I saw you last,” he 
was saying. “Got a good bit done too.” 

“Oh, really;” she answered dully. But she was think¬ 
ing: “Hell all yesterday, hell this morning, and it will be 
hell again when I go home this evening. I can’t stand it. 
I can’t stand it. All this fuss about the behaviour of Laura. 
I don’t care what Laura is or does. But yet ... I know 
what father means, and I know how it hurts him. It’s 
probably true about Laura too—hateful sort of woman. 
She’s Alan’s sister, though. Oh, it’s all so difficult and so 
wearying! Why can’t I have peace—peace?” 


54 


CHRISTINE 55 

“Chris, dear,” he said quietly, “you’re dreadfully worried 
and you’re not looking a bit yourself. What is it?” 

“Oh, nothing, nothing! I can’t always be bright, Alan. 
Nobody can. Everybody has moods, you know.” Her tone 
was almost petulant. 

But he persisted. “There’s something definite the mat¬ 
ter,” he said. “Tell me. I’d much better know. Is it the 
same old eternal question? Don’t be downhearted, Chris, 
my darling, over that. But tell me, tell me.” 

In the end she told him of the general’s new line of attack. 
She knew in her heart that to do so was both foolish and 
unfair: foolish because she would probably make him an¬ 
gry; unfair because he had already had enough to bear in 
the way of insult. But she was reckless and unstrung. 
Moreover, she felt herself to be out of touch and out of 
sympathy with him. Almost she wanted to see him wounded, 
so wounded was she herself after the battle of the past three 
days. 

He was angry. She had never seen him really roused be¬ 
fore. She listened to him in frightened silence for a while, 
and then her thoughts rallied in defense of her father. 

“My God!” cried Alan. “But this is too much! He’s 
said all kinds of things about me. They’re lies—but let 
him. I’m prepared to stand from him what I’d stand from 
no other man, because he’s your father. But when it comes 
to dragging Laura into it, it’s beyond endurance. Laura 
enjoys herself—why shouldn’t she? What the hell has it 
got to do with him, anyway? But she’s as straight in that 
way as you are, Chris, and I’ll not have her maligned by 
him or any one. And I’ll tell him so — to his face. I’ll make 
him eat his words, you see if I don’t. It’s outrageous, that’s 
what it is. He hates me and he’s jealous of me. And just 
because he can produce nothing tangible against me, he 
resorts to a low-down device like this to poison you against 
me and my family. And he talks about breeding! He has 
the impertinence to criticise my social standing. Is he a 
credit to his? I ask you, Chris, is he?” 

He said more, much more. He passed from the general’s 


THE BURDEN 


56 

treatment of himself to his treatment of Christine. He called 
him cruel and selfish and narrow-minded and snobbish. He 
declared that such treatment of a daughter was monstrous, 
cowardly, futile. He elaborated a comparison between 
the general and his own father, and his praise for his own 
father was extravagant. He said, in fact, nearly all that he 
had evidently been restraining himself from saying over a 
considerable period of time. He lost control of himself 
as she had never before seen him lost control. He was very 
righteously indignant. But that, unfortunately, was not 
how she saw his attitude at the moment. All that he had 
done was just to frighten her and then to anger her. He 
had angered her enormously. And his sudden regain of 
control, his abrupt silence for a space, while she glared at 
him, and his abrupt apology, “I’m very sorry, Christine. 
I’m afraid I’ve said more than I should have done,” did 
not pacify her. 

“You have,” she cut in furiously; “a great deal more. 
Father has been difficult and you’ve had a lot to put up 
with. I know that. But so have I. You seem to forget 
what I’ve had to bear. You forget, too, that he’s my father 
and I love him. You don’t know him, but I do. You can 
only think of him as unjust and selfish and . . . and all 
the other beastly things you’ve said about him. That’s 
because it affects you personally; that’s the selfish way of 
looking at it. But I know better. I know that he’s des¬ 
perately fond of me and that he believes that he is doing 
this for my own good. Do you think he likes it? He’s mis¬ 
erable, absolutely miserable, I tell you, and it makes me 
miserable to see him so unhappy. But it makes me furious 
to hear you talk as you’ve been doing. If you want things 
to go on you’ll never speak like that again. But perhaps 
you don’t. Perhaps you’re tired of it all. Perhaps your 
affection for Laura counts more with you than what you 
call your love for me. It looks like it, I must say.” 

She paused expectantly. Her lips were compressed into 
a hard, straight line. Her whole expression had hardened. 
Her eyes, wide open and angry, stared at him, but did not 


CHRISTINE 


57 

seem to convey the consciousness of him to her brain. Her 
curved nostrils were almost a sneer. She twisted her en¬ 
gagement ring round and round with the fingers of her 
other hand. It was nearly a threat; it was as though she 
were prepared to pull off the ring and push it across the 
table to him. 

“Say something,” she demanded. 

But he said nothing for what seemed a long time. With 
deliberation he took out a silk handkerchief—one that she 
had given him, she noted—and wiped his lips. He produced 
a cigarette, tapped its end and lit it. He blew a cloud of 
smoke upwards and then dropped the burnt match into the 
remains of his coffee. There was a little sizzling noise. And 
she was thinking: 

“Do I mean this? Do I love him still? Have I ever 
really loved him? Or has father been right all along, and 
is this just an infatuation which is ending now? No, it 
isn’t, it isn’t. I do love him, I know I do. But it would 
be better to seem hard and cold. It would be better to make 
him give me up. Perhaps he wants to, anyway. He would 
forget in time. He’s a man; they do forget in the end. And 
at least father would be happy. There would be an end to 
all this—an end, rest. And I should just be quietly miser¬ 
able.” 

Her self-pity soothed her as warm water soothes tired 
limbs. And she was weary. 

He spoke at last. His voice was low and quiet. 

“Chris,” he said, “listen a moment. This was bound to 
happen sooner or later. We are both very much over¬ 
wrought, and so we are liable to exaggerate circumstances. 
I’m dreadfully sorry that I let myself go as I did. I’ve no 
excuse. I saw that you were thoroughly upset, and I 
ought to have put a special guard on myself, instead of 
which I lost my temper badly. But, Chris dear, we’ve al¬ 
ways been frank with each other, and I must be frank now. 
I did, and I still do, resent what has been said against 
Laura. And I do feel bitter, awfully bitter, towards your 
father because of his behaviour all along. I’ve tried not to 


58 


THE BURDEN 


show it to you. Obviously it was up to me to do that; things 
were hard enough for you in any case. But when I see 
you suffering it cuts me to the heart. It drives me almost 
crazy sometimes, I feel so helpless and so angry that things 
should be as they are.” 

“It’s worse for me,” Christine said. 

“I know it’s worse for you. That’s what distresses me 
so. I’m trying to be honest with you. It’s no use my pre¬ 
tending that this won’t happen again. It will happen again. 
It’s bound to happen, simply because I love you and I 
cannot stand watching you suffer. Do you see?” 

“Yes, I know it’s hard for you. Is it worth it?—that’s 
the question. For you, I mean.” 

He leant forward over the table. 

“Let’s have this out,” he said, and she saw that he was 
tremendously in earnest. “Once and for all, it is worth it. 
I’m never going to give you up, Chris, whatever your 
father may say or do. The only person who can make me 
give you up is you yourself; and even then only if you 
can convince me that you don’t care any more. You’re my 
life now. You frightened me down to my very soul a mo¬ 
ment ago by hinting that you were prepared for a break. 
Don’t talk like that, Chris, for God’s sake. You terrify 
me. And don’t say that I put Laura before you. I don’t. 
I put no one before you. You come first—always and in 
everything, my only beloved.” 

“Oh, Alan!” The hardness had gone from her face and 
her eyes were glistening. “You’re very generous,” she said, 
“and if in future you sometimes get cross about things and 
can’t hide your feelings, I shall understand.” 

“But it’s dangerous all the same,” he commented thought¬ 
fully. “We love each other, don’t we, as much and as deeply 
as two people can? But each time this happens—and it’s 
certain to go on happening, as I told you—it puts an addi¬ 
tional and terrific strain on us. There’s got to be an end 
to it some time. We are not being fair to ourselves, that’s 
my point. I thought that time would make the situation 
easier, but it hasn’t. It’s making it harder. There’s a 


CHRISTINE 


59 

breaking point to everything. We’ve done our bit. We 
can’t in common justice be expected to hold out indefinitely, 
can we—honestly?” 

“No,” she admitted. 

“Very well, then. I suggest that the time has come to 
make a firm stand.” 

“How?” 

“I suggest that we go to your father and say: ‘Either 
you consent to our marrying within a certain time—two 
months or so—or else we take matters into our own hands.’ 
We’re not children, Chris, and we are wasting our lives in 
semi-misery when we might be riotously happy.” 

“He’d never forgive me,” she declared. She was ner¬ 
vous now that the question was definitely before her. Yet 
she knew that Alan was right. 

“He would. Of course he would. But he won’t change 
as long as things remain as they are. He’s got hope at 
present, don’t you see?” 

“It’s a desperate measure.” 

“Not desperate. Bold, that’s all.” 

“Can’t we wait a little longer? He must eventually see 
that I’m determined.” 

“He’s a pretty determined person himself, isn’t he?” 

Alan stretched out his hand and put it over hers as it 
lay on the table. The restaurant was emptying, but a waiter 
or two eyed them curiously. Both of them had the appear¬ 
ance of persons who had forgotten their surroundings. 

“Look here, Chris,” he said, “we’ve got to do something. 
If you won’t consent to my suggestion straight away, then 
you’ve got to take steps to make it clear to him that you 
are determined.” His voice and his whole manner had sud¬ 
denly become masterful, compelling. She was glad. It 
would be a relief to be taken charge of, to have definite 
orders given her. She felt that she could make herself 
obey his orders. 

“You’ve got to harden your heart and hurt him. I’m 
not saying this with any spiteful intention. I’m convinced 
that it will be kinder to him in the end, because it will 


60 


THE BURDEN 


put a stop to all this the sooner. It’s the only alternative, 
you understand.” 

“What do you want me to do?” 

“Retaliate. He behaves unkindly to you. You must 
make him feel your resentment. Don’t let him see that you 
are miserable. Be perfectly friendly and cheerful with him 
as long as he keeps off the subject of me and our engage¬ 
ment. At his first word against it, get up and leave him. 
Decline to allow him to persecute you any longer simply by 
not remaining to listen to him.” 

“But . . .” she began. 

“It sounds brutal, perhaps, but there’s a good chance 
that it will be effective. It can do no harm, and it will at 
least relieve you of some of the strain. I ask you, anyway, 
to try it; for a week, say.” 

“Very well,” she said submissively. “And afterwards— 
if it’s no good?” 

“Then I’m going to come down and insist on an inter¬ 
view with him. I’m not going to let you suffer any more, 
and I’m going to say so, blunt and plain. And if there’s 
the devil’s own thunderstorm, so much the better. It will 
clear the air. I’m not afraid of him, Chris, please realise 
that. I’d have had it out with him long ago, only I thought 
it would make things harder for you. But the time has 
just about come now.” 

She appreciated this new and masterful mood of his. It 
was what she needed; a tonic to her jaded nerves. It oc¬ 
curred to her that he would be a match for her father; that 
he was the only man she had ever met who could be. That, 
perhaps, was one reason why she loved him so much. He, 
too, was a determined person. 


CHAPTER SIX 


C HRISTINE’S first opportunity to “retaliate” came 
during lunch on the following day. The general had 
been commenting on a divorce case which he had seen in 
the paper. The wife, who had been treated with extreme 
cruelty and then deserted, was an old school friend of Chris¬ 
tine’s. 

“Poor Sylvia! Oh, I am sorry!” Christine said. 

“She married beneath her. It’s the sort of thing that 
does happen when a clean-bred girl does that. You’d better 
save your pity for yourself. You’ll need it sooner or later.” 

Christine stood up and, without even glancing at him, 
walked straight out of the room. 

She did not see him again until dinner, when, to her 
surprise and relief, he made no allusion to her behaviour 
at lunch. Emboldened by her apparent success, she em¬ 
ployed the same tactics on several other occasions. Still 
he made no comment. She began to get nervous. 

“It’s not like him,” she told Alan. “He’s not taking this 
as I thought he would. I expected him to bluster and 
storm, and I was ready to face that. But he hasn’t shown 
any anger at all. He’s mysteriously calm—and that fright¬ 
ens me.” 

“He’s beginning to see the futility of his attitude, and 
he’s looking for a decent excuse to climb down,” suggested 
Alan optimistically. 

“He’s going to try some other method, more likely.” 
Her guess, based on an accurate knowledge of her father, 
was correct. A week later the general announced in his 
abrupt way that he had let the house for three months, and 
proposed giving her the treat of an extended trip abroad. 
“We’re getting on each other’s nerves a bit here, I think,” 

u 61 


THE BURDEN 


62 

he said. His smile was almost genial; nevertheless she saw 
it as a smile of malignant triumph. She felt singularly help¬ 
less before him. So it was this that he had been planning; 
this was his counter-move to her scheme of retaliation. She 
might have known, she now realised, that her puny efforts 
to overcome him would be futile. But she had not expected 
this, and she had no answer ready. 

“I don’t want to seem ungrateful, father,” she began, “but 
. . . but I’d rather stay at home. You see . . 

He cut her short. 

“Yes, I know what you are going to say; but we won’t 
discuss that now. For this once you’ve got to consider me. 
The matter is settled. And we’ll have real fun, Chris, you 
and I. We’ve never had a trip together since you were 
grown up. I’m going to give you no end of a good time.” 

No end of a good time! Away from Alan, alone with 
her father for weeks, months, on end, deprived of Alan’s 
support and Alan’s sympathy, and exposed continually to 
that steady, unrelaxing pressure which her father had ap¬ 
plied in the past and would continue to apply, unhampered, 
in this alarming future. No end of a good time! She 
dreaded it. And yet ... it would seem heartless of her 
to refuse. It would be heartless regarded from his point of 
view. Fie was devoted to her. She was all that he had 
left. Without her he would be a lonely man; she was going 
to leave him to grow old alone. Pity for him surged up in 
her. If only he would soften a little; if only he would ac¬ 
cept her love for Alan as an unalterable fact and withdraw 
his opposition. She tested him. 

“Father,” she said quietly, “if I do this to please you, 
will you do something for me in return? Will you treat 
Alan as he has a right to be treated from now onwards, 
and give your willing consent to our marriage when you and 
I come back?” 

Instantly his face hardened. 

“I am not prepared to make any bargain,” he answered, 
“with him or about him. Get that quite clearly in your 
mind, please.” 


CHRISTINE 63 

Her pity ebbed. “He’s implacable,” she thought, and 
said no more. 

Her argument with Alan on the subject lasted for hours. 
He was on his guard against giving offence to her in his 
way of expressing himself, but there was no moving him 
from his opinion. From the moment of her telling him of 
her father’s project he took a firm line and held to it. 

“You need not go and, in fact, you must not go,” he 
said in effect; and not once, but scores of times. 

She pleaded with him. She urged that this would be a 
last concession, and that afterwards they would be en¬ 
titled to do what they chose. 

“We have already conceded too much,” was his retort. 
“Every time we give way we make the end harder for our¬ 
selves.” 

She put the case for her father before him with genu¬ 
ine emotion. 

“He’s getting old,” she said, “and since I’ve hurt him a 
great deal, I’d like to please him this once.” 

Alan listened to her patiently, but remained unmoved. 
Her father, he declared, had had his chance and misused it. 
And what prospect was there, what earthly prospect, that 
he would relent four months hence? 

“He will be more determined than ever,” said Alan. 
“Doesn’t he say himself that he will do no bargaining?” 

Finally there came his own appeal. 

“Chris,” he said, “listen to me a moment. I’ve been 
patient, haven’t I? I’ve been humiliated, and I’ve seen 
you humiliated and suffering. It’s been hell at times. I feel 
that I’ve earned the right to protect you in the future, and 
I’m going to exercise my right. I want to say this to you: 
You’ve got to choose now, once and for all, between me and 
him. I can’t and I won’t consent to play second string any 
longer. If you love me as you’ve said you do, and as I 
love you, you’ve got to put me first from now on. I can’t 
share you with him or with any one. We belong to each 
other—we’ve said that often enough, haven’t we?—and 


64 


THE BURDEN 


now we’ve got to prove it to ourselves—and to him. You’ve 
been brought to the testing point. The thing is simple, bur 
it’s vital, and it’s got to be settled now. Which is it to be 
—your father or me?” 

She faced his eyes squarely. 

“You,” she said without any hesitation. 

“You promise?” 

“Faithfully.” 

“Thank God for that!” he said. She saw relief, satisfac¬ 
tion, triumph in his expression. He had won, as all along 
in her heart she had wanted him to win. 

“Is your father at home to-night?” he asked. “If so, 
we’ll go straight down and see him now.” 

She made a half-hearted attempt to temporise, but he 
would not listen to her. 

“Better get it over at once,” he declared. 

The interview lasted barely a quarter of an hour. There 
was no rudeness displayed by either side, and only by an 
occasional sharp phrase could Christine, sitting silent except 
when one or the other of the two men appealed to her, judge 
of the intensity of suppressed anger which existed. The 
general received Alan with icy courtesy and provided him 
with a drink and a cigarette. His habit of being an atten¬ 
tive host was not affected by unusual or even exasperating 
circumstances. 

Alan went directly to the point. He admitted that he 
knew he was intruding where he was not welcome, but 
explained that the matter had become urgent. He stated 
that he and Christine had talked things over, and were 
agreed that they had waited long enough. He understood 
that there was some suggestion of an extended tour abroad. 
He regretted that that would now be impossible for Chris¬ 
tine, as she had agreed to marry him within the next three 
months. He touched upon finance, pointing out that he was 
in a position to keep a wife in reasonable comfort; his 
salary from the firm was to be increased from a thousand 
to fifteen hundred a year on his marriage, and he would 


CHRISTINE 


65 

have, in addition, his share of the profits as junior partner. 

He spoke quietly and with an air of dignified determina¬ 
tion for which Christine, knowing the extreme difficulty of 
the situation, admired him intensely. He ended up with 
a direct appeal to the general. 

“I’m more sorry than I can say, sir,” he said, “that you 
see the matter as you do. I hoped—we both hoped—that 
in course of time you would see it more favourably. I know 
that you are devoted to Christine, and I know how devoted 
she is to you. It is because of that that we have been patient 
through what has been an extraordinarily trying time for 
all of us. And it is because of that that we ask you now— 
both of us—to give your consent. We want it, indeed we 
do. But we mean to marry in any case: with your consent 
if possible, but without it if necessary. There is no earthly 
reason why we should wait any longer. I’ve got an income 
and a job. I’m respectable and I’ve got quite reasonable 
prospects of making good. We are neither of us children. 
We are old enough to know our own minds, and we know 
that we love each other. We’ve been pretty severely tested 
during the last few months—I think you’ll admit that—and 
we’ve stood the test. Therefore, we beg you now to accept 
the facts as they are and withdraw your opposition. Surely 
it isn’t too much to ask—now.” 

“Please, father . . .” Christine began, but the general 
interrupted her. He had listened to Alan’s appeal in hostile 
silence, but now he spoke. 

“It is too much to ask—now or at any time,” he replied. 
“I cannot prevent your marrying Christine—that is true. 
But I will not agree to what I consider an absolutely fatal 
step for her. I regard it as my duty to her as her father 
to oppose this marriage with every means in my power. I 
have done so, and I will continue to do so. In my opinion 
you are not a suitable person to marry my daughter. You 
mentioned money. Money, let me tell you, has nothing 
whatever to do with the case. I am not selling my daughter. 
If you had ten times your present income I should not feel 
any differently. If you two marry, you do so in defiance of 


66 


THE BURDEN 


me, and you, Christine, will have put an end to any possible 
affection between us. The choice, therefore, is with you.” 

“I think I have a right to know your reasons more defi¬ 
nitely,” Alan said. 

“You make the position difficult for me. You are a guest 
in my house, though an uninvited one. However, since 
you ask, you shall have your answer. I dislike your person¬ 
ality, I detest your views, and I am more than doubtful of 
your breeding.” 

Christine, turning quickly from her father to Alan, was 
in time to see the furious resentment in his eyes. For a 
second she expected him to flare up in anger. But he 
checked himself. Her heart went out to him at that mo¬ 
ment for his amazing self-restraint. 

“I see,” he said quietly. And that was all. 

“Choose, Christine!” the general commanded. 

She rose, crossed the room to where Alan was sitting, 
and stood beside him with her arm on his shoulder. 

“Since you will have it so, I have chosen,” she said. 

“There is nothing further to discuss, then, I imagine.” 
Her father’s voice was terribly hard, his features relentlessly 
grim. She would have liked to make one final appeal to 
him, but she dared not—literally she dared not. 

“It might have been worse,” was Alan’s comment when 
they were alone in the hall. He put his arms round her. 

“Don’t fret, darling. This had to happen some time. 
It’s a big step forward, really. He’ll give in after we’re 
married.” 

She was crying a little. 

“He insulted you. Oh, Alan, my dear, my dear, I’m sorry 
he said that! But you were altogether splendid.” 

Suddenly she raised her head from his shoulder and 
looked up at him. 

“I said I’d chosen. I have. Give me a fortnight to get 
some clothes and then—make arrangements. I can’t stand 
much more of this. I want to end it quickly—quickly, do 
you understand? I’ve only got you now. But that’s . . . 
but you’re everything.” 


CHRISTINE 


67 

Alan made all the arrangements. Within ten days the 
decorators were at work upon a little cottage at the end 
of a blind alley in Kensington. The cottage was old and 
low and quaint, an odd survival of an earlier period ma¬ 
rooned amongst ugly but more pretentious Victorian houses. 
It had its own walled garden in front and cobbled mews 
behind. It had only one storey and no basement. It was 
adequate in size and in the number of its rooms, but no 
more. Christine had loved it when Alan had shown her 
over it after it had come into the firm’s possession. It was 
to be his father’s wedding present to them both. Within 
a fortnight all the necessaries of furniture had been pur¬ 
chased. 

“Just enough to go on with,” they agreed. “We’ll pick 
up nice things later.” 

She found Alan’s energy and resource astonishing. He 
was working hard on his plans for the Chingford village, she 
knew, and yet he was able to spare time to draw up lists of 
their requirements, to help her choose, and to consult with 
her on every detail of their scheme of decoration. He 
possessed, she discovered, the faculty for organising. He 
organised everything on a fixed plan, forgetting nothing 
and omitting nothing. She would never have believed it 
possible to do in the time what actually was done. And 
when she said so to him, he laughed and answered: 

“Wonderful what can be done when there’s a real in¬ 
centive. And the incentive here is the most adorable person 
in the world. Besides—I love hustling.” 

She told her father nothing. She went about her affairs 
and disregarded him entirely. He asked no questions about 
her doings, made no reference to Alan or to the future, 
scarcely spoke to her at all. He informed her casually, 
however, that the house was let from the 15th June—it 
was then the last week in May—and said that he would be 
glad to know where she proposed to live when he went 
abroad. She replied that she would tell him later. He ap¬ 
peared to take not the slightest interest in her existence. 

She ordered what clothes she needed and had them sent to 


68 


THE BURDEN 


her club. She made arrangements so that when the day of 
her wedding came she would merely have to walk out of the 
house and go up to London as on any ordinary day. She felt 
no remorse at what she was about to do. The issue had 
been plainly put before her father. He had been given his 
chance and he had declined it. This, then, was to be her 
answer. She would take no further risk by warning him 
beforehand. She would say nothing. She would walk out 
of his house without a word, and she would return to it 
only when she was permitted to do so in the company of 
Alan—Alan duly recognised as her husband. She, too, was 
determined to show that she possessed the Helyar pride. 
She had suppressed her pride and allowed herself to be 
humiliated for long enough. She had no remorse. But 
she had regrets. For all the conventional festivities and 
social ceremony of a wedding she cared little or nothing. 
She was not really disappointed because she was not des¬ 
tined to appear in sacrificial white and be the centre of at¬ 
traction to a nudging, interested gathering of friends and 
strangers. But she had wanted to go from the arm of her 
father to the side of her chosen man—just that, as a proof 
that the past was to be obliterated and old wounds allowed 
to heal. She regretted that she had been forced by the per¬ 
verse obstinacy of her father into doing what she had 
always hoped to avoid doing. “This hole-and-corner busi¬ 
ness/ 5 as she called it, was distasteful to her. But ther'e 
was no alternative if she was to marry Alan at all. She had 
been brought to see that clearly enough. And she was 
irrevocably determined to marry the man whom she so 
passionately loved. Wherefore she put her scruples behind 
her and made her secret preparations. 

They were married on the second day of June in a small 
church in Bayswater, and there were present as witnesses 
to the ceremony Alan’s parents and the verger, and no one 
else. She arrived at the church by herself in a taxi, dressed 
for travelling and apparently self-possessed. But she was 
close to tears when old Mr. Carnes, meeting her at the door 
and patting her hand with an affectionate, kindly: “Well, 


CHRISTINE 


69 

my dear, you look very sweet,” led her up the aisle to give 
her away. She felt lonely, miserably lonely and friendless, 
just during the time it took her to walk the length of the 
empty church. And then she was beside Alan, and he was 
smiling down at her, proudly, lovingly. 

“It’s all right; it's all right,” she told herself, and took 
control of her nerves again. 

u . . . In sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, 
till death us do part.” She loved the confident ring in 
Alan’s voice as he repeated the words. She felt the pres¬ 
sure of his hand on hers, as if he were emphasising the 
solemnity of his vow, secretly, to her alone. There was 
no tremor in her own voice when her turn came. 

u . . . and thereto I plight thee my troth.” 

“But I gave it long ago, really,” she thought to herself. 
“I gave it that golden day on the downs above Dorking. 
It was as binding then as it is now . . .” 

They lunched, the four of them, extravagantly well. Mr. 
Carnes was jocular, Mrs. Carnes had to be dragged back 
from the verge of the sentimental at frequent intervals. 
Alan, on his own admission, was disgracefully proud and 
ludicrously happy. And Christine? Christine was not sure 
of herself. She was happy, relieved, nervous, shy, worried 
with thoughts of her father still in ignorance at home, tired 
after the strain of it all, eager to get away, and yet unwilling 
to seem discourteous. 

But by half-past three the luggage was strapped to the 
back of Alan’s car and Christine was kissing the slightly 
flushed countenance of Mrs. Carnes. 

“We’ll have everything in order for you when you come 
back, dears,” said Mrs. Carnes. 

“Leave it all to us. Enjoy yourselves and don’t worry,” 
shouted Mr. Carnes above the hum of the engine. 

Christine looked back and saw them standing side by 
side in the doorway of the restaurant. They were waving 
handkerchiefs with blatant unconcern for the dignity of that 
most select establishment. She waved back to them. 

“They’re perfect dears,” she said. . . . 


THE BURDEN 


70 

They were going north for a three weeks’ trip in the car. 
At Hampstead she made him stop for a moment, and they 
looked down on the immensity of London spread below 
them, a panorama in grey in the clear air of this June even¬ 
ing. 

She touched him with her shoulder and then felt for his 
hand and held it tightly. 

“Somewhere down there,” she said softly, “is our home, 
the Home Beautiful that we’ve so often talked about.” 

“I know, Chris darling. And we’re going to make it that, 
you and I. We’ve had to fight for each other, but we’ve 
won now. The future is ours—ours only. Isn’t it so?” 

“To make or to mar—-yes.” 

“To make. You don’t doubt it now?” 

“I never doubted. Drive on, my Alan, into the future.” 

The car moved quietly forward again. London was be¬ 
hind them; life was ahead. 


CHAPTER SEVEN 


I T was arranged that they should spend the last night of 
their honeymoon at the same old-fashioned hotel, some 
fifty miles from London, where they had spent the first. 
In secret, Alan had wired to engage the very same room. 

“Not that we’re in any way sentimental,” laughed Chris¬ 
tine, when he afterwards admitted having done so. 

Quite early in the period of their engagement it had be¬ 
come a catch-phrase with them, this smiling denial of senti¬ 
mentality. But each was happily aware that sentiment per¬ 
vaded all their thoughts of each other. They wanted it to 
be thus. They were lovers—splendidly sensible lovers in 
their own estimation, with a wide comprehension of the 
meaning of love in all its forms and manifestations—but 
still lovers. 

“It is the little things, all the little trivial things, that 
count so much,” Alan had once said. “They go to the 
building up of something big and solid and lasting, like 
bricks to the building of a house.” 

She had understod him and had agreed with him. Life, 
she had enough experience to know, was like that, a partially 
ordered mass of little things into which there might upon 
occasion be thrust something big enough to cause their 
disintegration or a marvellous welding of the whole. 

He had come into her life and changed it. The mass of 
little things had stirred and ranged themselves into a pattern 
at his bidding, like iron filings at the mysterious, unseen 
bidding of a magnet. Everything centred now upon him. He 
was a lover worthy of the name. It was that which she had 
wanted from the time when she had begun to think about 
love at all. She had never, since her twentieth year, desired 
marriage in the abstract, “to have a home and a husband,” 
that is, and the status of a married woman. She was no 

71 


THE BURDEN 


72 

prude. She had had her flirtations and her “good times.” 
She had trifled light-heartedly and had enjoyed the sense 
of power which her attractions had given her. But through 
it all she had kept a firm hold upon herself, and her heart 
had never before been touched. She possessed a deep, as 
opposed to a superficially protective, moral sense, and be¬ 
neath a gay pose and the easy banter of social intercourse 
she concealed high ideals of the sanctity of love and the sac¬ 
rament of sex. She recoiled inwardly from wantonness, even 
in thought, yet had always been inquisitive and had hoped 
that experience would one day be hers. But she had de¬ 
sired, when the time came, to give all for ever and to receive 
all for ever. She had awaited the coming of a lover who 
would be worthy of her own ideals. 

Then Alan came and swept her into love with him. What 
had been a wild, unanalysed impulse at the start had broad¬ 
ened and deepened into a love that enshrined passion like a 
shining jewel in its calm content. She knew that she loved 
him as she would never again love any man. 

Through the months she had tested herself and had tested 
him. She had given her trust to him wholly, and almost 
blindly. She was justified in him. He had proved himself 
a helpmate indeed. He had stood by her steadfastly with 
unselfish, magnificent devotion. He had been her comfort 
and her standby, amazingly patient, amazingly understand¬ 
ing and kind. But when the time had come to have done 
with patient submission to an intolerable situation, he had 
had the courage to act. At what she had judged to be pre¬ 
cisely the right moment he had assumed control of her des¬ 
tiny and linked it irrevocably with his own. Truly enough 
could he say, “We’ve won now.” She loved him for the 
strength of purpose with which he had brought her to the 
final step. . . . 

She had written to her father on the morning of her 
wedding, and posted the letter immediately after she was 
married; a short letter, explanatory, conciliatory, affection¬ 
ate still, but in no way humble. She said, in effect, quite 
simply: “There was no other way but this. We hope that 


CHRISTINE 


73 

the past is now done with. Let us forget it and be as we 
always were, you and I.” She gave him a list of addresses 
on her route. But in the three weeks that she was absent 
she received no letter from him. 

It was the one thing that slightly marred the perfection 
of her happiness. But she steadfastly refused to allow it to 
grow into a grievance or a grief. If her father chose to re¬ 
main obdurate, it was a pity, it was unnecessarily foolish 
of him. But it should not affect her. For her Alan should 
suffice. Such was her determination and such also was her 
conviction. . . . 

“I am all yours. Take me,” she had said to Alan. “I 
want to be your delight.” But his gentleness had surprised 
even her, who knew him to be gentle. Her fears, those fears 
which hitherto in spite of herself she had not been able to 
suppress, vanished before the tender solicitude of this lover 
who was worthy of her. She knew him as that then, as she 
had never known him before. She worshipped him for his 
restraint, for his marvellous, intuitive understanding of her. 
And her response when at last it could show itstelf in the 
full flood of her passion for him was his triumphant reward. 

They were lovers, but they were comrades too, as day 
slipped away after happy day. They wandered, with no 
fixed route and no fixed plans, driving the car by turns to 
any place which it occurred to them to visit. They 
chose old inns in old towns as far as they could do so. They 
bought things for their home—bits of furniture, books, blue 
china—and had them despatched to await their return. They 
reached York, and loved its ancient aloofness, which seemed 
to defy the modern life flowing through its narrow streets; 
then Edinburgh and all the sights that had to be seen; then 
the Highlands, with short runs in the car and long walks 
over the hills; then south again and some wonderful days 
in the Lake district, watching sunlight chasing shadow over 
mountain and over vast placid surfaces of water. 

They were companions, delighting in each other’s ideas 
and talk and thoughtful silences, just as, being physical 
lovers, they delighted in each other’s bodies. They talked 


THE BURDEN 


74 

often of comradeship, trying to arrive at some definition of 
their idea of it which would satisfy them both. 

“It’s the basis of real love,” Alan would say. “It’s the 
foundation of the structure of which passion is the coping 
stone. Love, as you and I have come to understand it, can’t 
begin to exist without comradeship. But equally, comrade¬ 
ship is only made perfect between a man and a woman by 
the addition of mutual passion.” 

But Christine differed. “I don’t see it quite like that,” 
she would answer. “You can’t call comradeship the founda¬ 
tion—necessarily. It may exist before passion is born, but 
it may grow out of passion or it may develop simultan¬ 
eously with passion, or blend with it or even be part of it. 
And after all, you must admit that passion, real, genuine, 
fierce passion can exist without any degree of comradeship 
at all.” 

“Ah!” retored Alan quickly, “but for how long? That’s 
just the point.” 

It was a point to which they frequently recurred. Priding 
themselves on being sophisticated persons, capable of step¬ 
ping mentally to one side and scrutinising their own im¬ 
pulses as worked out in their own actions with less than 
the normal bias of prejudice, they enjoyed dissecting their 
own and each other’s personalities. And this question of 
the function of comradeship in a deep love such as theirs 
intrigued them. 

“Cut comradeship out,” suggested Alan. “Imagine for 
a horrid moment that we have nothing in common, you and 
I, except physical attraction. How long would that last? 
It would be dangerous, even with us, to prophesy. What 
shall we say? Ten years, five, less?” 

“Agreed—possibly,” she admitted. “But take the other 
case. Cut out physical love. Assume that for some reason 
or other physical love became impossible, would our com¬ 
radeship last; last, I mean, exactly as it is now?” 

“Yes,” he said. “Why not?” 

She shook her head doubtfully. “I think not,” she an¬ 
swered. “You see, I don’t believe that love is to be sep- 


CHRISTINE 


75 

arated, arbitrarily, into component parts like that. Passion 
isn’t one thing and comradeship another, for a woman— 
for me—at any rate. The two aren’t just mixed and capable 
of separation. They are not blended like a brand of tea, 
but fused together, like blue and yellow paints making 
green, or like copper and—what is it?—zinc, making brass. 
That’s how I feel it as a woman. I love you, and that 
means that I love you with my heart and my mind, and my 
spirit and my body.” 

“x\nd I you,” he asserted at once. 

“Yes, but . . . Alan, I’m not now thinking of you per¬ 
sonally, but of men in general. Wouldn’t I be right in say¬ 
ing that the physical side is more of an incidental; to be 
satisfied somehow—if not with the loved one, then else¬ 
where? And if it were satisfied elsewhere, through neces¬ 
sity, we’ll say, would not comradeship certainly suffer, 
then wane, then shrivel up and die?” 

“You mean that mental faithfulness cannot exist along¬ 
side physical unfaithfulness?” 

“Yes—something like that.” 

“Perhaps—yes, I suppose you are right. But my belief 
is that mental faithfulness, and that’s only another way of 
saying loyalty, comradeship, makes physical faithfulness 
inevitable; otherwise there is no loyalty. Tor better or 
worse, in sickness and in health’—such is my interpreta¬ 
tion of that. See?” 

She saw his argument, but she was not convinced. 

“But men are different,” she maintained. And then, no¬ 
ticing that his eyes were troubled, she smiled fondly at him 
and laid her hand on his. 

“But not you, my Alan,” she added. “You’re not the 
ordinary man. I couldn’t doubt your loyalty to me—what¬ 
ever happened.” 

“Nothing is going to happen,” he asserted confidently. 
“Nothing that could make any difference to us, anyway. 
We’re protected, Chris, because we’ve had the courage and 
the common sense to thresh it all out and to face facts, and 
because we know how to be frank with each other.” 


76 


THE BURDEN 


“I’m not ashamed to call myself an idealist, all the same,” 
she said quietly. 

“Nor I. We are idealists, you and I. We’ll fall short of 
our ideals, that’s certain. But they exist, nevertheless, and 
they’ll help us. There’ll be difficulties; marriage can never 
be easy. One is apt to talk glibly of ‘give and take,’ but 
the thing is to know when to give and when to take.” 

“That’s where the value of mutual frankness—honesty it 
is really—comes in.” 

He nodded. “The philosophic lovers explain their the¬ 
ory,” he said, with a laugh. “We’re astonishingly clever, 
aren’t we?” 

“Wise, rather. Oh, ever so wise!” 

He caught her in his arms. “And yet,” he said, “we can’t 
explain why it is that this thrills us as nothing else can ever 
thrill us.” He crushed his lips to hers and held her to him 
so closely that for a long moment she could draw no breath. 

“It doesn’t need explaining,” she said at last. “It just 
is so.” 

Their three weeks were over. They had traversed Eng¬ 
land almost from end to end and had seen something of 
Scotland. Purposely, on their way south they had driven 
through a long stretch of the Black Country. 

“This is one of the glories of modern industrialism,” Alan 
had said rather bitterly. “Bit of a contrast after the Lakes, 
isn’t it?” 

“Need it be like this?” she demanded. 

“It grew up haphazard. We’ll give them the benefit of 
the doubt and assume that they knew no better in those 
days. But we do know now, and we’ve got to alter things. 
It could be done.” 

She appreciated his preoccupation with this subject. She 
knew that it was his ambition to make it his life’s work. 
Already he had begun. He had been given a chance and he 
had made a beginning. 

“You’re going to be one of the pioneers in this—some 
day,” she told him. . . . 

The distance dial of the speedometer, set back to zero 


CHRISTINE 


77 


by Alan before they started, registered seventeen hundred 
and thirty-eight miles when they drew up at the hotel 
whither they had come on the evening of their wedding day. 

“It’s been an absolutely perfect trip,” said Alan as they 
sat down to dine at a table in the window, open to the 
fragrance of a garden gay with June flowers. He began to 
talk enthusiastically of the performances of the car. “One 
puncture—otherwise not a mishap of any kind. And we’ve 
not spared her, have me?” 

*But for once Christine was scarcely listening to him. 
She was musing—dreamily, happily. Inevitably the thought 
occurred to her of how much had happened to her since 
she had last sat down to dinner at that table. Her mind 
dwelt lingeringly upon the wonder of it all. She remem¬ 
bered Alan’s whispered question to her: 

“Darling of mine, you’re not afraid of me?” 

Afraid! She had not been afraid of him, but only a little 
timorous when she stood upon the threshold of fulfilment. 
But that had passed—easily and naturally. And how glad 
she had been, how immensely proud, to yield to him, to give 
herself to him—wholly and for ever. The wonder of it— 
this passionate yearning of the body, blending miraculously 
with the yearning of the spirit and the mind. She knew now, 
she understood, what Alan had meant when he had talked to 
her of “the tremendous, overpowering force of it.” She was 
no longer a girl. She was a woman who knew what it was 
to swoon under the blinding ecstacy of love. How often 
had he not told her, in the old, troublous days that were 
past, that fulfilment, when it came, would make amends for 
all? Fulfilment! She gloried now in her new-found knowl¬ 
edge of all that fulfilment had meant to her and would 
mean throughout a marvellous, inspiring future. 

“Tired, Chris, darling?” 

She turned brooding eyes to his. 

“No. Just dreaming.” 

Miraculously he interpreted what her thoughts had been. 

“Dear, you were sorting out your memories of these 


THE BURDEN 


78 

three weeks. Bless you—and it’s only beginning, really.” 
He filled her glass with champagne. 

“Here’s to our home—our own home,” he said. . . . 

He came and stood over her as she lay in bed. It was 
a hot night and she had pushed the coverings back as far 
as her waist, displaying her bare white throat and arms. 
A fine silk nightdress ineffectually concealed the curves of 
her body. Her hair, spread over the pillow behind her head, 
was a background to her beauty. She lay quite still, watch¬ 
ing him as he looked down upon her. She was proud of 
her body and not in the least shy before him now. His un¬ 
abashed admiration for her beauty enraptured her. 

“My wonderful, my beautiful Chris,” he said softly. And 
then suddenly he was kneeling beside her and had taken her 
hand in his. She rumpled his hair with her other hand. 

“You look like a schoolboy of sixteen, you queer darling,” 
she told him fondly. 

“Chris, my only beloved,” he whispered. “It’s got to be 
like this between us always. It’s goti;o be as perfect ten 
years hence as it is this evening, as it will be to-morrow 
when we arrive home. Passion always ebbs, they say. But 
we won’t let ours ebb. We’ll keep it glowing, always. We’ll 
watch over it, tend it as one tends a fire, feed it with the 
other sort of love, with comradeship and sympathy and devo¬ 
tion. It’s all so wonderful now that I dread the thought of 
losing any scrap of it ever. I love you, oh, my darling, 
I love you so!” 

She drew his head down to her breast, and spread her 
hair over him like a protecting veil. 

“We’ll not lose any of our love,” she answered him. 
“We’ll keep it all.” And then: “Alan, oh! Alan dear,” 
she whispered tremulously, and waited till his mouth came 
thirstily to hers. 


CHAPTER EIGHT 


ENERAL WRACKE-HELYAR sat in a deck chair in 



V3T the garden of “The White Cottage,” Kensington, with 
his grey Homburg hat tilted over his eyes and the sunlight 
dancing on his highly-polished shoes. Christine sat beside 
him. It was nearly tea-time on an afternoon in late July. 
She had been back in London a month, but this was the 
first time she had seen her father since her marriage. He 
had written to her once or twice in connection with certain 
legal documents relating to money which now came to her 
under her mother’s will. He had written stiffly: “Dear 
Christine,—Reference the enclosed, please sign where indi¬ 
cated. I’ve seen to it that everything is in order”—barely 
more than that on each occasion. She had invited him to 
come and see her, but he had ignored her invitations. And 
then on this particular morning, speaking gruffly over the 
telephone from his club at lunch time, he had said: “That 
you, Chris? If you’re alone this afternoon I’d like to have 
a look at you. ’Bout three-thirty or so. Good-bye.” 

She had hurried down the garden path to admit him her¬ 
self through the newly painted green gate. 

“Father! But how ripping to see you again!” She had 
thrown her arms round him and hugged him, thinking to 
herself that though he looked strained and tired about the 
eyes, he was as smartly turned out, as handsome and as erect 
as ever. 

“Well, young woman!” had been his greeting—the greet¬ 
ing with which he had been wont, in old days, to welcome 
her home to him for her holidays. 

She noticed that he avoided all reference to Alan, and 
in that she followed his lead. She was waiting to discover 
what his attitude was to be. But when she showed him 


79 


80 


THE BURDEN 


over the house she found it impossible not to mention Alan. 
“This is our bedroom/ 7 she had to say, or “This is Alan’s 
little study” (a minute attic, this, containing a big draw¬ 
ing table, strewn with papers and half-completed plans of 
houses). 

He noticed bits of furniture—and since he rather fancied 
himself as a judge—he asked questions. 

“Looks good, that,” he would say. “Where did you 
pick it up?” And she would be obliged to tell him that it 
had been Alan’s at Oxford, or that they had spotted it in 
the window of an old shop somewhere on their honeymoon. 
Her father made no comment. 

But the living room, running the full width of the house 
with four casement windows facing south, attracted him 
most. It was decorated in the cottage style: bright check 
curtains, much willow pattern china, a tiloleum floor that 
really might have been of genuine red tiles, oak beams, an 
ingle nook fireplace and oak furniture. 

“This really is a charming room,” he declared, looking 
round it carefully when they returned from upstairs. 

“Alan’s father gave us the house, you know,” said Chris¬ 
tine casually, “and he made it a condition that he should 
have the decoration of one room in it. He loves that sort 
of thing. Well, this is the result. He’s been most awfully 
generous to us. One minute, father, and I’ll see about tea.” 

She came back to find him sitting at her desk in the cor¬ 
ner, blotting something. He rose and pushed a paper into 
her hand. 

“That may be of some use to you,” he said. 

She looked at it. It was a cheque for £200. 

“Oh, father!” 

But he declined her thanks. 

“For yourself, mind you,” he said significantly. 

“We share everything,” she retorted. But he strode out 
into the garden again without replying. 

He had tea. He told her that he had been living at his 
club since the house was let. He gave her news of friends, 
and talked of his progress with his book. He was genial, 


CHRISTINE 81 

companionable, affectionate. Then suddenly he leant over 
and laid his hand upon her knee. 

“Are you happy, Chris?” he demanded, jerking the ques¬ 
tion at her as a barrister jerks a sudden question at an 
obstinate witness. 

“Happy!” Her smile confirmed her tone. “Do I look 
miserable? There’s only one thing . . . father, you’re go¬ 
ing to be friends, aren’t you, with both of us?” 

He stood up. 

“Well, it’s no use fighting you any more, anyway,” he 
declared. “Make him take care of you, my dear, and come 
to me if he doesn’t.” 

It was a grudging capitulation, but knowing him, she 
realised how much it had cost his pride to go even that far. 
She knew that, in effect, he had owned himself beaten. He 
had tried to cut himself off from her, but he had come 
back to her in spite of himself. Therefore in the end all 
would be well. She kissed him good-bye, and then waited 
impatiently for Alan’s return from his office. Inevitably 
Alan would grin and say, “Didn’t I tell you so?” Alan, she 
told herself, was frequently right about things. 

Towards the end of August they were able to say that 
they had “settled down.” Actually, they agreed to avoid the 
expression. 

“It sounds so commonplace,” said Christine. “As though 
we were just an ordinary married Couple.” 

“As though romance had already given place to rou¬ 
tine,” Alan agreed. “Whereas . . —he threw a quick, 

fond glance at her—“whereas it never will.” 

Nevertheless they had settled down, and routine had laid 
its hold upon them. They had got the house furnished and 
arranged to their liking; they had acquired servants who 
appeared reasonably willing to serve; they were growing 
accustomed to the purely domestic side of sharing a dwell¬ 
ing-place. 

Alan was extremely busy with his plans for the model 
village. He left home before nine in the morning, and was 


82 


THE BURDEN 


seldom back before seven in the evening. Occasionally he 
returned with a roll of drawing papers under his arm and 
continued working in his study after dinner. 

“I’m sorry, darling one,” he would say. “But don’t think 
of this as the normal. I shall be able to ease off as soon as 
these plans are finished and approved.” 

But Christine, far from objecting, rejoiced in his indus¬ 
try. Her ambitions for him, already high, mounted higher 
as she watched the rapid progress of his work. He ex¬ 
plained that it would not be possible to leave London till 
the autumn. 

“We hope to lay the foundation-stone of the first house 
late in September,” he told her. “After that, we’ll get away 
for a bit, you and I. We’ll have a second honeymoon—better 
even than the first.” 

“Could it be?” she queried reminiscently. 

She recognised that though his work absorbed him while 
he was actually engaged in it, he could turn away from it 
to devote himself to her. At least once a week he met her 
in the evening at her Richmond golf club, and they played 
till dusk came, dining late at the club house and motor¬ 
ing home afterwards. Each week-end they drove far out 
into the country and spent the Saturday night at some 
secluded inn. On the Sunday it was their habit to do a 
long walk before returning home in the evening. Both of 
them loved physical exercise, and loved to achieve the bliss¬ 
fully satisfying sensation of healthy fatigue. 

They agreed that they were scandalously unsociable 
where other people were concerned. 

“I don’t seem to want to be with any one but you,” said 
Christine, “but we’ll have to do something about it soon.” 

“I know; but it’s August, and nearly every one is away. 
Plausible excuse, anyway. Let’s wait till the autumn, when 
I shall be more free. At present I want you all to myself 
when I’m not working.” 

Her father went abroad half-way through August. But 
before that he had been to see her several times, and once, 
at her very special request, he had come to dinner. She was 


CHRISTINE 


83 


nervous at the thought of a meeting between him and Alan 
—in her talks with her father, Alan’s name was mentioned 
with discretion by both of them, as though it might cause 
trouble—but she was determined, nevertheless, that they 
should meet. 

“I shan’t be contented till they are friends,” she told her¬ 
self. “Be nice to him—he loves me,” she told Alan, a mo¬ 
ment or two before the general’s arrival. 

She was conscious that the evening was a strain on all 
three of them. There were no silences, indicative of actual 
hostility, and there was a skilful avoidance of dangerous 
topics. But she knew that the conversation was carried 
on with a forced geniality. She knew that they were all of 
them uncomfortable. Still it was a beginning: it was some¬ 
thing of a triumph to have made them meet. Deliberately 
she left them together for a while after dinner. After¬ 
wards, when she asked Alan what they had talked about 
when they were alone, he smiled and answered: 

“The war in the East compared with the war in the 
West, mostly. Architecture—a little. You—just to agree 
that you were looking pretty well. He praised the port, too. 
But when I told him Dad had given it to me, he dried up 
rather.” 

She went up to him and kissed him. 

“You’re a dear to be so forgiving,” she said. 

“Oh, that’s done with now. I’ve got you, Chris. That’s 
what matters. . . .” 

September came and she found her days dragging a little. 
She was an efficient housekeeper, enthusiastic in so far that 
she insisted upon orderliness and liked “to have things 
nice,” as she said, but not enthusiastic to the point of re¬ 
garding her household duties as a hobby and a pleasure. 
Wherefore, she got through what had to be done with speed 
and was left with much time on her hands. She tackled 
Alan on the subject. 

“I’d like some sort of a job,” she said. “Don’t think I’m 
discontented, though. I know you’ve got to stick hard at it 
for the present, and I know I ought to be satisfied with the 


THE BURDEN 


84 

house job, and shopping, and calls. But I’m not, Alan. I’m 
like you. I suffer from a superfluity of energy, and, unlike 
you, I can’t work it off. See?” 

He was sympathetically concerned at once. 

“Of, course I see, and I’d love you to be busy with some¬ 
thing. How selfish of me not to have thought of it before. 
Just because I’ve got my own job, I suppose. Let’s think.” 

They discussed the matter and in the end Christine de¬ 
cided on a course of fashion-plate drawing. She had been 
above the average in her school art class, and had once had 
ambitions in that direction which the war had eclipsed. She 
became the enthusiastic pupil of a drawing-master who 
taught her something, but certainly less than his fee war¬ 
ranted. But she kept herself busy; she was interested, and 
she was pleased by Alan’s praise of her efforts. 

It was over the question of accepting or refusing an invi¬ 
tation to spend a week-end with the Dumaynes in Surrey 
that they had their nearest approach to a quarrel. Christine 
was strongly against going, but Alan, admitting frankly 
enough that he would much prefer to have the time alone 
with her, persisted that they ought to go. 

“Oh, ‘oughts’!” said Christine crossly. 

She disliked the Dumaynes. For weeks she had been 
putting off the day when she would have to ask Laura Du- 
mayne up to stay with her. (Laura had already been to 
see her twice, and had each time extolled the usefulness of 
possessing a spare bedroom.) It was difficult, however, to 
argue with Alan on the matter. She was reluctant to show 
him her dislike for his sister, but she was equally reluctant 
to subject herself to the uncongenial atmosphere of the 
Dumayne household for thirty-six hours. She held out ob¬ 
stinately against his persuasiveness, and only gave in, and 
then with no good grace, when he said, almost sharply: 

“Well, it’s an obligation. Think of it like that, please. 
We’ve got to go.” And he added: 

“I’m not going to have my people saying that you are 
rude.” He laid emphasis—faint but unmistakeable—on 
the words “my” and “you,” as if to imply, as the uncom- 


CHRISTINE 85 

pleted part of his sentence, “whatever your father may un¬ 
justly have said of me.” 

Christine was wise enough to suppress all signs of the 
annoyance which she felt, and the argument ended at that 
point with her acquiescence. But the incident had im¬ 
pressed her. There had been a conflict of will between 
them, and he had proved himself the stronger. She was 
annoyed at his having won, and yet pleased with him for 
winning! 

In the end she endured the Dumaynes without serious 
strain upon herself, and came away somewhat softened 
towards Laura, and saying to herself: 

“After all, she means to be kind and friendly, and I 
daresay she has a lot to put up with from the unpleasant 
Ronny.” 

Ronny irked her. His appearance, his voice, his views 
and his manner displeased her quite enormously. It was 
an effort to her to hide her displeasure. She avoided con¬ 
versation with him whenever she reasonably could and con¬ 
centrated upon old Mr. Carnes. Mr. Carnes, having dis¬ 
patched his wife to Harrogate, had also come down to the 
Dumaynes for the week-end, for the express purpose, so it 
seemed, of making himself pleasant to Christine. 

“I like young people with ideas, and I know you’ve got 
’em,” he informed her, and invited her to stroll in the gar¬ 
den with him. 

Christine had already grown fond of the old man. He 
was kind-hearted and broad-minded, and all his sympathies 
were with youth and the future. He was a man who had 
kept himself young for his children’s sake, and though 
Laura, perhaps, regarded him and his theories with the tol¬ 
erant patience of one who was only interested in an unthink¬ 
ing present, Alan, as Christine was well aware, adored him. 
She talked to him of Alan, and of how wonderfully happy 
he had made her, and, watching Alan’s father slyly as she 
spoke, she noted his embarrassed look; he was acutely 
pleased, but was trying earnestly not to display the fact. 
But she enticed him to talk in his turn of Alan’s work 


THE BURDEN 


86 

and Alan’s future career. He spoke appreciatively of the 
plans for the model village. 

“Real good—though I say it as shouldn’t,” he declared. 
“Artistic, and yet thoroughly practical all through. Oh, 
he’ll do, he’ll do! Don’t you fret, my dear girl.” 

An idea occurred suddenly to Christine, born out of her 
passionate desire for Alan to succeed and to succeed quickly. 

“You’ll have some sort of a ceremony when the founda¬ 
tion stone is laid, won’t you?” she asked. 

“Hadn’t meant to, no. Means a fuss and a lot of time 
wasted arranging it. Not much point in it either. It 
isn’t like a memorial hall or anything.” 

“Oh, but Mr. Carnes—it’s Alan’s work!” 

He smiled at her. “Not altogether. Give his poor old 
father some credit.” 

She pushed her arm impulsively through his. 

“You’ve made your name. Perhaps you’re not ambitious 
for yourself any more. But you’re ambitious for him, 
aren’t you—like I am? If there was a bit of a splash made 
over this, wouldn’t it give Alan a lift up? Ceremony, im¬ 
portant people there, speeches, Press reports, mention of 
‘fine work by brilliant young architect’—all that sort of 
thing. Surely it would help him. And I know I should 
be awfully proud to be there.” 

Again he smiled at her; but she could see that he was 
vastly pleased. 

“You’re a remarkable young woman,” he observed; “and 
if Alan doesn’t get on, it won’t be your fault. We’ll see 
what we can do. Now don’t say anything to him yet. It 
will be our little secret for the present—until it’s fixed up.” 

She stooped and plucked a rosebud. 

“Here’s my pledge of secrecy,” she said and, while she 
was pushing it through his buttonhole, bent quickly forward 
and kissed his cheek. 

“You kind dear,” she added. . . . 

The week-end was certainly not such a waste of time as 
Christine had anticipated. 


CHAPTER NINE 



,FTER a rainy, gusty week the morning of the 2nd 


\ October, the day on which the foundation stone was to 
be laid, was fine and promised to be sunny later on. The 
2nd October had been Christine’s choice, accepted at once 
by Mr. Carnes when she reminded him that on that day she 
would have been married just four months. 

Mr. Carnes had “fixed things,” as he called it, with unique 
completeness. He reported progress to Christine at inter¬ 
vals, either by telephone or by taking her out to lunch, 
unknown to Alan, and chuckling over his account to her of 
how things were going. A week before the actual day 
Christine was informed that she might now tell Alan all she 
knew. She was able to tell him that the foundation stone, 
on which would be duly engraved Fecit Alan Carnes, 
A.R.I.B.A., would be laid at 12.30 p.m. by the local Mem¬ 
ber of Parliament; that the Mayor and Corporation of the 
Borough would be there in full regalia; that there would be 
present representatives of the local Chamber of Commerce 
and Trades Council, the Building Trade Union, the Archi¬ 
tects’ Association, the Surveyors’ Institute, the Army, the 
Navy, several ex-Service-men’s Associations, the Boy Scouts, 
the Clerks’ Union, the Railway and the Press; that there 
would be a lunch for eighty guests afterwards at the Royal 
Forest Hotel; and that he, Alan, would unquestionably be 
called upon to make a speech thereat. She was also able to 
tell him, but refrained from doing so, that she had definitely 
vetoed Mr. Carnes’ suggestion of including the local brass 
band and a detachment of Territorials. 

Alan was frankly horrified. 

“But, good Lord!” he exclaimed. “What do you two 
lunatics in conspiracy against a harmless architect think 


87 


THE BURDEN 


88 

this is? A coronation or an Armistice Day, or something?” 

She contemplated him with an affable, but at the moment, 
profoundly irritating smile. 

“Not at all,” she replied. “It’s a clever puff for the bene¬ 
fit of an obtuse and presumably quite incompetent young 
man.” 

And the morning of the 2nd October dawned fine. . . . 

They drove down in the car, Alan in morning coat and 
top hat, by Christine’s order, and on his own admission, ner¬ 
vous; Christine herself, outwardly calm and possessive 
and managerial, but inwardly quite inordinately proud, in 
a tailor-made coat and skirt of russet brown and a hat that, 
while blending with them, yet managed to suggest that 
though winter might be coming, spring was bound to fol¬ 
low. 

“But what in heaven’s name am I to say?” demanded 
Alan. “And in these silly clothes, too!” 

“That this is unquestionably the thin end of the wedge, 
or the first nail in the coffin, or the beginning of the end, 
or any other stock phrase which will lead up to your explain¬ 
ing that decent housing is a practical possibility, and that 
you are the man to show them the way to attain it.” 

“You’re a quaint, dear child,” he retorted, “but apt to 
exaggerate.” 

They reached the ground at a quarter-past twelve. It 
was a golden day of early autumn; the faintest hint of 
coming winter in the wind, warm sunshine, fleecy balls of 
cloud drifting across a blue sky, and the forest in the back¬ 
ground reluctantly turning from green to sear. 

Mr. Carnes had already arrived. In receiving them he 
was jocular, but evidently in reality rather fussed. He 
deposited them within a special roped enclosure, where 
they joined Mrs. Carnes, visibly palpitating and clad in 
magenta, crowned by a flower-stall of a hat. Christine 
looked about her, recalling the day when she had first come 
thither with Alan, an eternity ago when they were merely 
engaged. Then she had seen a slightly undulating piece of 
grassland, and had built visions upon it. Now the grass 


CHRISTINE 


89 


was trampled and mud-bespattered. There were excava¬ 
tions and lines of planks, and seemingly derelict barrows 
and piles of bricks dumped anyhow here and there. On 
every side were signs of activity, of work, or indications 
that constructive work was about to be begun. She was 
enormously thrilled. From to-morrow onwards hundreds 
of workmen would be engaged in erecting a Colony Beau¬ 
tiful, corresponding to the House Beautiful, which she and 
Alan shared; scores of homes destined for people who had 
previously lived in mere brick boxes, and who would in time 
come to realise, through their joy in these very homes, that 
life was a much wider and more splendid affair than they 
had ever believed it. And the conception of it all, the de¬ 
sign of all this was Alan’s, Alan’s! Her heart throbbed 
with a sudden and delightful pride. He was going to be 
an exceptionally big man, her Alan. 

She brought her eyes back from the contemplation of 
the estate as a whole and fixed them upon the Mayor, a 
surprisingly meagre-looking little man (whereas she had 
pictured all mayors as obese), who was explaining to the 
M.P. (“a hard-faced man,” she thought, “prosperous out 
of the war”) exactly how a foundation stone should be laid. 
There was a crowd—quite a large crowd already, and it 
was swelling rapidly. People were swarming across the 
grass from the direction of Chingford. Boy Scouts were 
collecting large green tickets labelled: “Chingford Model 
Village; Foundation Day. Admit. . . She tried vaguely 
to distinguish between Trade Union officials and their 
sworn enemies, the representatives of the Chamber of 
Commerce. Evidently there were no enemies here. Every¬ 
body was chatting amicably; everywhere the sun and the 
occasion seemed to have produced smiles and the spirit 
of co-operation in a worthy task. Alan was talking to a 
man in a top hat. Evidently he had gravitated in sheer 
desperation towards a human being clad like himself. 

“I feel all queer with excitement,” announced Mrs. 
Carnes in a tone which gave away her motherly (and 
wifely) pride in the whole affair. 


THE BURDEN 


90 

Suddenly a trio of Boy Scout buglers sounded (inappro¬ 
priately) the “double.” The Mayor fussed his way into 
prominence and having stated that there was no need to 
introduce Mr. Burgin, their respected Member, proceeded 
to do so in an eulogistic but not perfectly grammatical 
speech. Mr. Burgin responded, speaking brave words on 
the theme of “Homes for Heroes.” He was emphatic and 
assertive. The Government had pledged itself; the Govern¬ 
ment would keep its pledges; England should be made a 
worthy place for those to live in who had fought and suf¬ 
fered for her and for her just cause. Private enterprise was 
showing public spirit. They were there to-day to lay the 
foundation stone of the first house in this new village. 
They must realise that it was the public spirit of a justly 
renowned firm which had made the plan feasible. Co¬ 
operation, whole-hearted and willing, between all concerned 
in the work, from the head of the firm himself down to 
the humble but yet equally indispensable worker who laid 
brick upon brick, would undoubtedly carry the experiment 
through to an artistic, a practical, and a useful conclusion. 

“As if he cares a tinker’s curse!” whispered Alan to 
Christine. She nodded, and smiled up at him; but she 
was not at the moment weighing the sincerity of Mr. Burgin, 
M.P., in the balance. Enraptured, she was contemplating 
the vision of Alan in the years to come, Alan as the author¬ 
ity in the country on town planning, Alan appointed, per¬ 
haps, with the approval of a grateful nation, to the newly- 
created post of Minister of Housing. 

Mr. Burgin tapped the stone firmly with a mason’s mallet. 

“I declare this foundation stone to be well and truly 
laid,” he announced in a voice of authority. The buglers, 
not quite in unison, repeated their fanfare. . . . 

Lunch, served in a private dining-room, was a feast. Mr. 
Carnes had seen to that. The reporters (Mr. Carnes had 
also been careful to see to them) made mental notes to use 
the word “munificence” later. There was champagne, amia¬ 
bility, clattering plates and clattering talk, a pervading 
sense of optimism and good fellowship. “This,” thought 


CHRISTINE 


91 


Christine, “will be no end of an advertisement.” She chat¬ 
tered to Alan and kept an ear on the conversation in her 
neighbourhood. It was amusing to note how easily Mrs. 
Carnes and the Mayoress drifted back from town planning 
to house management; interesting to hear the Mayor assur¬ 
ing the gratified Mr. Burgin that the constituency was 
unquestionably “sound,” and to hear Mr. Burgin condemn¬ 
ing the power of the trade unions as “highly dangerous to 
the rest of the community.” 

“Hypocrite!” thought Christine. “He was almost prais¬ 
ing them half an hour ago.” 

Following the handing round of cigars and coffee, came 
the pushing back of chairs and an air of expectancy. 

Mr. Carnes proved himself an able and a genial chair¬ 
man. His speech, welcoming them on this “hopeful” occa¬ 
sion, was short, informative as to the aims of the experi¬ 
ment, optimistic as to the outcome, sympathetic as to the 
needs of city workers for “labour-saving accommodation in 
pleasant surroundings,” wittily deprecating as to his own 
altruistic motives, but emphatic as to “reconstruction” 
being a word which meant doing something and not merely 
talking big about the future. He called for a vote of 
thanks to Mr. Burgin. 

Mr. Burgin, made even more emphatic by champagne, 
repeated much of what he had said in the morning, adding 
eulogies on every one concerned in what he now referred 
to as “this great, far-reaching enterprise—the precursor, I 
am bold enough-to prophesy, of a gigantic national move¬ 
ment to make this dear land of ours a true paradise on 
earth.” 

The Mayor spoke—rather ramblingly and with many 
glances at his menu, upon which he had made notes. Fie 
proposed the health of Mr. Carnes, “whom we may already 
regard as a munificent benefactor to this borough.” 

Mr. Carnes replied—suitably and modestly—and ended 
by hinting that there were many busy men amongst them 
whose time was being taken up. A voice called out: 

“What about the architect? We’re not going to break 


THE BURDEN 


92 

up without congratulating him, surely.” (Applause.) The 
owner of the voice, a young man at the far end of the 
table who, it transpired later, was an architect himself, rose 
and called upon Alan. 

“Say what you feel,” whispered Christine encouragingly 
as he stood up. 

But she could see that he was nervous. He began with 
halting thanks for the honour done him and informed his 
audience that he was extraordinarily lucky to have got the 
job. “Through influence, there’s no disputing that, I’m 
afraid,” he added, indicating his father with a smile. There 
was encouraging laughter when old Carnes nodded solemnly; 
and Alan, so it seemed to Christine, recovered his self-confi¬ 
dence. She had told him to say what he felt—and he did. 
He spoke from his heart on the question that was nearest 
his heart, this question of the provision of homes that 
should be more than mere hollow boxes of brick. He spoke 
simply, without rhetoric or metaphor or elaboration. But 
his sincerity was as evident as his knowledge of his subject, 
and created its own impression. He sat down amid very 
genuine applause. 

“Well done!” said Christine quietly. But her eyes were 
shining. She was more than usually proud of him at that 
moment. 

“We’ll drive home the same way as we did that first day 
I brought you here, shall we?” suggested Alan. 

“Yes, let’s,” Christine agreed, “and remind ourselves of 
how much has happened since then. Not that we’re senti¬ 
mental, of course.” They laughed joyously. The sun still 
shone warmly and, God being unquestionably in His heaven, 
all was very right with their world. 

As he drove they talked eagerly of the events of the day. 

“It all went off splendidly,” she said. 

“Dad does know how to organise a thing once he’s put 
his mind to it.” 

She loved the admiring way in which he always spoke of 
his father. “They’re real friends, those two,” she would tell 
herself, and would race on into the future to picture her 


CHRISTINE 


93 

own son, Alan’s son and hers, making a friend of Alan. 
But they had decided against children for a year or two 
yet. “We want ourselves for each other for a while,” they 
had agreed. 

“Does my Alan feel rather proud of himself?” she asked. 

He dodged a careless pedestrian with a quick twist of 
the wheel. “Silly fool! Fancy stepping into the road like 
that without looking. Proud? Why, yes, darling, to be 
really honest, I am; though I wouldn’t admit it to any one 
but you. I’m bursting with pride. Not just because of all 
this fuss to-day, you know, but because I feel that the 
designs for this village really are good. It’s a big bit of 
work and I honestly believe I’ve done it well. I know I’ve 
got it in me to make a name at this sort of thing. That’s 
why I’m proud. Do you understand, or do you think me 
disgracefully conceited?” 

“My dear, of course I understand. You have a right to 
be proud. And this is only the beginning, remember that. 
I know you really mean it when you say that it’s not all 
this ceremony business to-day which counts with you, but 
that it’s the work itself which is the real thing. Of course 
it is. All the same, being a woman, I’ve been awfully thrilled 
by to-day’s happenings. Oh, Alan! I was proud—sitting 
there and listening to your work being praised.” 

They talked on. Alan was full of plans for the develop¬ 
ment of similar schemes in other places. Finance, he ex¬ 
plained, was the difficulty. If only the first experiment 
could be made to pay its way he was sure his father would 
risk fresh ones. 

“It’s going to pay,” declared Christine confidently, and 
argued stoutly against his more cautious view of the pos¬ 
sibilities. 

They were nearing home. They had stopped for a moment 
on Hampstead Heath to look down upon London as they 
had looked down upon it four months before. 

“At just about this time, if you remember,” Christine said. 

He pressed her hand. “Yes, I remember.” 

They had passed Swiss Cottage and were approaching 
Lord’s. 


94 


THE BURDEN 


“Let’s make a beano night of it to-night/’ he suggested 
suddenly. “We’ll dine—yes, we’ll dine where we went that 
first night I ever took you out. And we’ll go and laugh at 
some silly revue. Shall we?” 

“Yes,” she said eagerly. “And after that we’ll dance.” 

They were passing Lord’s. There was a clear space ahead 
of him and he accelerated a little. 

“And after that?” He glanced at her, caught her eye 
and made her blush. “And after that, O dear my love?” 
he asked again, and held her look with his own, so full 
of passionate ardour. 

“After that, O importunate man ...” She looked 
away from him, looked up and saw a taxi emerging from a 
side turning not five yards ahead of them. There was one 
appalling second in which she realised that a collision was 
inevitable. Her half-stifled gasp of terror preceded the crash 
by a fraction of that second. The car swerved in response 
to Alan’s frantic twist to his steering wheel—too late. A 
terrific bump and crash—then darkness, and she was con¬ 
scious of nothing more. 


PART TWO 


Alan and Christine 


CHAPTER TEN 


HEN there is no hope whatever?” Alan spoke the 



JL words slowly, as though forcing himself to pro¬ 
nounce them. 

“I’m afraid I can see none.” 

“My God!” said Alan, and again, with his voice trailing 
off into what was almost a whimper of despair, “My God! 
0 my God!” 

The consulting-room became a blur in which there floated, 
distinct and malicious-looking, the sharp, white features of 
the specialist who had given his verdict. But the specialist 
was not malicious. He was kindly. 

“My dear boy,” he said gently. “It’s tragic for you. I’m 
sorry, desperately sorry. I’d hoped at one time . . He 
put a firm hand on Alan’s shoulder. “You’ve got to think 
of her, you know. You’ve got to go all out to make things 
less hard for her. That’s the way you must look at it, all 
the time. I’m right, am I not?” 

“Quite right.” Alan’s voice was unsteady still, but the 
room was no longer blurred to his eyes. “She’s been plucky 
enough, God knows,” he said. “She will be still, even when 
I’ve told her. I know her. I know the sort of stuff she’s 
made of. It’s . . . it’s up to me.” 

He stepped out into the drizzling rawness of a mid- 
December afternoon and stood for a moment looking up 
the straight, unsympathetic length of Harley Street. 


95 


96 


THE BURDEN 


“Tragedies like this must be happening every day in 
this cursed neighbourhood,” he thought. 

A taxi-driver jerked an interrogative head at him, but 
he scowled and walked past. He hated taxis and their 
drivers now with an insensate, impulsive hatred. He de¬ 
cided to walk home. That would at least postpone for a 
little time the appalling moment when he would have to 
face Christine and tell her that she was doomed never to 
walk again. 

It had been a bad crash. Even now, nearly three months 
afterwards, the memory of that awful half-second of realisa¬ 
tion twanged constantly on his nerves—that moment when, 
looking up, he had seen the taxi emerging from the side 
turning within a few yards of him. It had not been his 
fault. It had been proved to the satisfaction of an insurance 
company that he was on his proper side of the main road 
and moving at a reasonable pace, whereas the taxi-driver 
had not sounded his horn, was on his wrong side, was driv¬ 
ing recklessly, and was not perfectly sober. He, Alan, had 
done the only thing possible in the circumstances: he had 
turned inwards and so avoided hitting the taxi absolutely 
broadside on. The impact had thus been slightly lessened, 
but it had still been great enough to cause Christine to 
be thrown out over the near side door and against the side 
of the taxi. He himself had been bruised and cut by the 
broken glass of the wind-screen, and the taxi-driver had 
been merely jolted. Such were the simple facts of the acci¬ 
dent, as brought out in the evidence in the case against the 
taxi-driver. Alan was exonerated, and the taxi-driver was 
duly dealt with by the law. Christine lay in hospital for 
two whole months, with no power of movement and very 
little of feeling from her waist downwards. 

During those two months the truth as to her condition 
had been withheld from her by the doctors’ orders. 

“She’s not in a fit state, after the shock, to be frightened 
with what are, as yet, only possibilities,” they had said. 
And so she had mefely been told that her spine had been 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 97 

badly jarred, and that she must not expect to be right again 
for some time. 

“Are they telling me the truth, Alan darling?” she had 
asked him over and over again. “Is it really just a matter 
of time?” 

He had kissed her, and soothed her, and lied to her. 

“Why, of course, my precious. But you mustn’t let your¬ 
self worry.” 

But there had been cold dread in his heart all those 
weeks. For he knew the real facts. He knew that the X-ray 
examination had shown a fracture-dislocation of the spine 
in the lower dorsal region. The main part of the fractured 
vertebra was jutting against the spinal cord, pressing upon 
it, and so causing flaccid paralysis of the legs. 

Weeks of agonised suspense! He had demanded, and 
had obtained, exact and non-technical explanation of the 
case and of how they were treating it from day to day. He 
had pestered the doctors and surgeons with endless ques¬ 
tions, had studied medical books, had prayed and cursed 
and brooded and even wept in the silence of his own home 
—so desolate without her. He knew, or thought he knew, 
all that there was to be known of the chances for and 
against recovery. 

“Chance!” he would think. “Oh, God! Must it just de¬ 
pend upon chance?” 

There came the day when it was said to him: “As you 
know, we’ve been trying the ‘extension’ method—using 
weights to drag the spine back into position. We’ve suc¬ 
ceeded in that. The dislocation has been reduced, but the 
symptoms have not improved. Another X-ray examination 
shows the formation of callus—that is, new bone—round 
the crack. We expected this—it’s the normal thing—but 
we hoped that when it formed it would exert its pressure 
in a harmless direction. That, unfortunately, is not so. 
We think we should operate to remove the callus. It’s the 
best chance now.” 

They had operated. Further weeks of waiting, and then 


THE BURDEN 


98 

had come the removal of Christine from the hospital to 
her own home. 

“She’s well enough in herself, she wants to go, and she 
would be happier there. Yes, let her go,” the doctors had 
agreed. And in response to Alan’s demands for some definite 
statement: 

“We will know soon now. A fortnight or so. Be patient, 
there’s a good chap.” 

And now they knew; now he had been told. The spinal 
cord was irretrievably damaged. She would never walk, or 
even stand, again. 

“Then there is no hope whatever?” 

“I’m afraid I can see none ...” 

Alan walked through the Park and Kensington Gardens 
towards home. She would be lying there waiting for him, 
she who knew where he had been that afternoon and who 
would demand to be told what he had heard. And he had 
got to tell her. Useless to prevaricate, to lie to her any 
longer. It had to be faced, this frightful fact. Fie could 
not face it without her. He could not meet her eyes and 
continue to deceive her. She would have to know, now, at 
once, so that they could cling to each other, comfort each 
other. He realised suddenly that in his own misery at the 
tragedy which had come upon her he was aching for her 
sustaining comfort. 

“Lord! But that’s damnably selfish!” he thought. “I 
. . .I’ve got to go all out to make things less hard for 
her.” 

He stood still for a moment, leaning against the railings 
of the asphalt path. The bare trees dripped dismally and 
the murmur of London’s movement sounded far away. 
Staring at the lamplight reflected in the puddle at his feet, 
he muttered: 

“All out—I’ve got to go. I will. Oh, God! help me to 
do that.” 

He walked slowly on. 

The thought which had been torturing him through all 
those weeks of suspense came back to torture him now. 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


99 


The accident had been partly his fault. Easy enough to 
say that he had been on the near side, and, being on a 
main road, had precedence; easy enough to blame that 
drunken swine for swinging out of a side turning on the 
wrong side and without warning. But he, Alan, knew at the 
back of his mind that he had allowed his attention to be 
diverted from the road ahead of him to the passenger 
beside him. He had been absorbed in her, absorbed not 
only in what she was saying but in how her eyes were 
looking at him. Thus he had come to glance up one second 
too late, thus had he lost that extra second of warning 
which he might have had, and which might have enabled 
him to avoid the crash. 

“She’s got to lie there for ever and it was partly my fault. 
. . . Chris, oh Chris! and I love you as I never thought I 
could love anybody. You’re my world—nothing else counts 
but you. You, with your vigour and your energy, and your 
zest in life . . . and it’s ended. You can never be vig¬ 
orous any more. Oh, my God! How will you bear it? How 
can we ever endure what’s before us, you and I?” 

He walked on, turning over and over in his mind the 
events of the past two months; the hospital, his daily visits 
there with that terrible sickening dread growing in him 
hour by hour, and struggling always to show itself in his 
expression; the knowledge that she was always watching 
him—with eyes that were appealing yet trustful, anxious 
and yet bravely hopeful; the strain, the appalling strain of 
fighting with his dread, holding it back under reckless cheer¬ 
fulness so that she should not know; the operation; the 
long wait till they were able to tell him: “She’s stood it 
very well—and we have great hopes as to the result.” Hopes, 
merciful God! And now—no further hope whatever. But 
she might live thirty, forty years, a prisoner on a couch. 
She was twenty-six. She was approaching the prime of her 
womanhood. In another year they would have begun to 
think about children. Children—they could never have 
children now . . . Through his fault . . . partly his 
fault. His mind went back to the hurried return of the gen- 


THE BURDEN 


100 

eral from abroad and of the stormy scene which had taken 
place between them. In that, at least, he had had some 
satisfaction. He had been goaded into saying what he 
really thought of that malevolent old man; mad with fury 
and pent-up resentment and with the effects of his des¬ 
perate anxiety he had spoken his thoughts. For the general 
had said wild, insulting things. 

“Didn’t I prophesy disaster, if she married you?” he 
had demanded. “Look what you’ve done. You’ve wrecked 
her life, you careless criminal fool, you.” And more, much 
more, with his face brick-red and his voice rising to a 
shout. It was then that Alan had let himself go. 

“You!” he had said. “You dare to talk to me of your 
love for her! What do you know of love? For nearly a 
year you acted with deliberate, malicious cruelty towards 
her. You persecuted her, you did your utmost to make 
her life with you a hell. You hurt her more than anyone 
but she will ever know. But you couldn’t break her. She 
endured you because she was fond of you. She was patient 
with you as not one girl in ten thousand would have been. 
But in the end even her patience gave out and she came 
to me. We were happy. We’re going to be happy again 
when she’s recovered. But what help have you been? Wliat 
help are you now? All you can do is to make wild accusa¬ 
tions against me. Is that the boasted creed of your caste— 
to hit a man when he is down?” 

Oh! but it had been so very good to let himself go like 
that. It had been a relief, a purge, as it were, to his mental 
system. And it had done good. For the general had proved 
his quality. He had sought out Alan, and he had apologised. 

“I said what I had no right to say,” he admitted. “The 
police court case proves me entirely wrong. But in any 
event I should have apologised for what I said. I beg your 
pardon.” 

From then onwards their relations had been easier. It 
was at least possible for them to meet by Christine’s bedside. 

“But,” thought Alan, turning out of the Gardens into 
Kensington High Street, “but what in God’s name is the 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


101 


use of that now? What’s the good of being on friendly 
terms with him, when Chris—oh! as though anything 
matters but her.” 

As he walked up the short gravel path to his own front 
door he met the general letting himself out. 

“She seems much more cheerful this afternoon,” said 
the general pleasantly, and then, with a quick glance at 
Alan: “You look pretty glum. What’s the trouble?” 

“'Didn’t Chris tell you? I’ve been to Rayford this after¬ 
noon—to get his final verdict.” 

“Well?” The general held himself straight. His whole 
body was stiff. It was as though he was bracing himself 
to allow Alan to hit him straight between his unflinching 
eyes. 

“By God!” thought Alan, in spite of himself, “but the 
old man has got a fine courage.” For the answer to that 
quietly spoken “Well?” had already been read in Alan’s face, 
and Alan knew it. 

“There’s no further hope,” said Alan, slowly. He repeated 
the details which the specialist had told him. The general 
listened without a word. Then he said: 

“Poor little Chris!”: and again, with a momentary break 
in his voice, which he coughed into concealment, “Poor 
little Chris!” 

Alan realised what he had never realised before till that 
moment—that this hard, vindictive, proud old man adored 
his daughter. 

“We’ll have to tell her soon. It’s not fair to her to . . . ” 
the general began. 

“/’m going to tell her, now,” said Alan, meaningly. 

“Steady, steady. We’d better think this out. Mustn’t 
rush it. Must be careful over it.” 

But Alan could stand no more. He wanted to be alone 
with Christine in order to get this frightful thing over. 

“Look here, general,” he said abruptly. “I’m dreadfully 
sorry if I seem rude. I know she’s your daughter, and I 
know how fond you are of her. But she’s my wife . . . 
and I worship her. This is my business—and God help 


THE BURDEN 


102 

me in it! Please go.” And when the general hesitated: 
“Go! Go, man, for Christ’s sake go away and leave me 
to it.” 

He put his latch key to the door, and opened it. The 
general was walking slowly towards the garden gate. For 
once, for perhaps the only time in his life, his head was 
down and his shoulders bent. . . . 

“Alan, darling, I thought you were never coming.” 

The loose sleeves of her dressing jacket fell back as she 
stretched out her arms to greet him. He forced a smile as 
he looked down at her, then bent over and kissed her gently 
on the lips. She was pale from long lying in bed and from 
the effects of the operation. But she looked adorably sweet, 
so he thought, as she lay there, so patient, so eager to wel¬ 
come him home, so loving towards him. 

“Father’s only just gone. Did you meet him? Why, 
you’re all wet! You didn’t walk home in the rain, you stupid 
dear? You’d better change quickly or you’ll catch a chill, 
and then there’ll be the pair of us helpless.” 

So like her, he told himself, so exactly like her to think 
of him at this moment when she must know that she was 
about to hear her own fate. 

“No, I’m all right. I’m not really wet. Yes, I saw your 
father for a moment. He couldn’t stop, he said.” He 
jerked out his silly little sentences, threw them out as a 
sort of protective screen in front of the awful thing that 
somehow he had got to tell her. 

“Well, and what had funny old Rayford got to tell you? 
Foxy little man, I always think, with his sharp nose, and 
hair that was meant to be red.” 

God! She could joke like this! The pluck of her, the 
stupendous pluck! He sat down on the edge of the bed 
and took her hands in his. 

“Chris darling,” he said softly, “look at me a moment. 
Look at me hard. I want you to.” 

Her big brown eyes, those steady eyes that he had never 
yet seen to show fear, met his. 

Then she knew, knew for certain, exactly that which all 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


103 


these weeks she had more than suspected. She felt his hands 
close hard on hers, so hard that her fingers were crushed 
almost painfully. She saw the look of mute agony in his 
eyes and then heard him speak, between the gulps of hard, 
choking sobs. 

“Chris, Chris darling—I love you. . . . You know 
that, don’t you? If it had been anybody but you I could 
have gone on pretending for a bit . . .just to put things 
off. But . . . you’re not . . . one of those. You want 
to know, and I’ve no right to hide it from you—now that I 
know. . . . Beloved, my only beloved, there’s no hope, 
they say. We’ve got to face it, you and I. God! oh, God!” 

Tears, merciful tears, came to him. His head dropped 
forward on to her breast, his hands still held hers. 

“I’ve been prepared for it.” She spoke quietly, almost 
soothingly. “Don’t worry yourself that this is a frightful 
shock to me. You were right, quite right, to try to keep 
me hopeful while there still was hope. But I’d ceased to 
hope. Even before the operation I’d ceased to hope— 
really. But it was brave of you to tell me, frankly and 
honestly, as soon as you knew for certain. We’ve always 
been like that, haven’t we, my Alan—frank and honest with 
each other? And . . . and I’ll learn to ‘stick it,’ as you 
men say, somehow or other. But it’s you. Oh, Alan, my 
poor Alan! with a useless, helpless, bedridden wife to be 
a drag on you for always. Darling, my darling, I’m so 
miserably sorry for you.” 

He lifted his head to look at her. 

“Oh, my dear!” he cried, with adoration in his voice. 
“You can think of me—now, at this awful moment. But 
you ... oh, Chris, it’s I that ought to be comforting 
you! Dear heart, you are the bravest, finest person I’ve 
ever known.” 

He slipped down on his knees beside the bed. 

“Chris,” he said, “listen a moment. You are never to 
think of yourself as a drag on me. You could never be, 
never, do you see? This is going to make no difference, 
you understand. Yes it is, though. It’s going to draw us 


THE BURDEN 


104 

even closer together. We are going to be more to each 
other than ever we were. We can be lovers still—lovers in 
the real sense, as you and I understand the word. We can 
go on loving each other with our minds, and with our spirits, 
and that’s what really counts. That’s where the wonder, 
the miracle of it all began, and that’s how it will continue. 
We’ll make it go on, you and I. There shall be no change 
in that.” 

Her fingers caressed his hair, gently, lovingly. She was 
crying a little, soundlessly. His words, expressing the depth 
of his love for her, had stirred her deeply. She was more 
conscious of her pity for him at that moment than of her 
own spoilt life. 

“But it wouldn’t be right, my dear,” she said. “You think 
now that it will make no difference and that I won’t be a 
tie. But I shall be. You’re a man, you see. You’ve got 
big interests already and a big future before you. I believe 
in you and in your work. I’m not going to let myself come 

between you and it. It’s more important than I am. And 
)> 

“But without you how could I . . . ” he began to protest. 

“Yes, Alan. Without me as I shall be now you’d be 
more free. You’d have a better chance. Darling, you must 
get free of me. It will hurt—horribly. But it could be done. 
I think it ought to be done.” 

She spoke steadily. She was perfectly sincere. To lose 
him now, she felt, would mean the end of all things for her. 
And yet, in a mood of self-martyrdom, she felt that she 
was suggesting what was best for him, because it would 
give him every chance. Her ambitions for him were high 
enough to overtop her own longing to have him with her 
always to take care of her and comfort her and go on 
loving her. 

“Get free of you?” he said. “Do you mean to suggest 
that we should separate?” 

“Yes.” 

For the first time since he had entered the room he 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 105 

smiled. It was almost his normal, chaffing smile, reserved 
for her alone. 

“Well, never suggest anything so ridiculous again, you 
astonishing person. It’s not done, that sort of thing. You 
can’t discard your husband like a bus ticket. I’m here 
for life, and you’ve got to put up with me. See?” 

Then, his voice becoming suddenly serious again, he 
went on: 

“Chris, darling, I spoke lightly then because . . . be¬ 
cause what you said was almost too much for me. But I’m 
not thinking lightly of it. Your splendid unselfishness— 
don’t imagine I don’t understand it. I do. But that’s not 
the way for us. We need each other still. I need you 
desperately much, now as always. We took each other 
‘for better, for worse.’ We meant it then, and we mean 
it still. Isn’t that so?” 

“Yes, Alan.” 

“Very well, then. Here is the test. It’s a bigger test than 
we ever expected. So much the better. It’s a $ner oppor¬ 
tunity for us. Haven’t we always stressed the comradeship 
side of our love? Now we are going to prove that it’s not 
only the basis of everything, but that it is sufficient in itself. 
We are going to show that it can exist by itself. It shall 
be made to grow and blossom and be the most beautiful 
thing in our lives—all through our life together.” 

“Alan! Oh, Alan! Is it possible—without ...” 

“Yes,” he asserted, with exultation, sudden and fierce, 
in his voice. “Yes. We’re going to make it possible. It’s 
not going to be easy, but that’s why it’s going to be splendid. 
It’s a task, but we won’t look upon it as a task. We’ll look 
upon it as a glory. We’ll look upon ourselves as two of 
the great lovers of the world. Haven’t we always felt, 
and said to each other so often, that our love was not an 
ordinary love, but splendid, indestructible, ennobling? 
Here’s the test for it, and the future shall be its proof.” 

She drew him close to her. Their eyes met and held, 
blue to brown, in a long look of ecstatic worship. 

“Oh! my Alan, my only beloved!” she whispered. 

“God bless you, Chris.” 


CHAPTER ELEVEN 


W ITHIN a little more than a month Alan and Christine 
had completely adjusted the material side of their 
lives and the routine of their household to suit the unalter¬ 
able fact that Christine could not walk. Having resolved 
to face this fact and to let it “make no difference,” they 
really did face it in such a way that it made as little dif¬ 
ference as was humanly possible. They were quick to 
realize that, in order to adapt themselves to a changed 
situation with ease and without a harassing sense of altera¬ 
tion, it was necessary to adhere, as far as they could, to 
what had previously been the normal. 

“I’m not an invalid, and I decline to be treated like 
one,” was what Christine said. “I just can’t walk, that’s all.” 

They had intended putting up a partition in the big 
living room on the ground floor and making a bedroom 
for Christine there. But the necessity for that was obviated 
by the generosity of old Mr. Carnes, who, at his own ex¬ 
pense, arranged for the installation of an automatic lift. 
He was extraordinarily kind, and as soon as he had grasped 
the essential fact that Christine disliked being regarded 
as an object of pity, extraordinarily tactful. Christine, 
during her time in hospital, had grown to love him. His 
sympathy towards her, and his deep affection for Alan, 
had completely won her heart. Now that she was back at 
“The White Cottage” he was constantly dropping in to 
see her and bringing her little gifts. 

She protested. “I won’t be regarded as an invalid to be 
pampered,” she told him. He merely laughed. 

“Far from it. But don’t tell me that an old man like 
myself may not pay his court to a pretty woman. Mustn’t 
let my wife suspect anything, my dear.” He laughed again, 
pretending to be mysteriously discreet. 

106 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


107 

The lift, once installed, was a godsend. The wheeled 
chair in which Christine spent her days, fitted into the 
lift, which she could work herself. Thus she could move 
over the whole house, superintending its management exactly 
as she had previously done. A nurse had been engaged to 
attend upon her—she could not dress herself or bath herself, 
and she had, of course, to be lifted in and out of her chair 
and her bed—but the nurse, who, by special request, did 
not wear nurse’s uniform, was referred to as a “companion,” 
and was seldom in evidence. Christine came down to break¬ 
fast at the usual time. She was dressed for dinner, and 
had her meals in her accustomed place opposite Alan at 
the oak refectory table which had been an important item 
in Mr. Carnes’ decorative scheme for the room. Alan slept 
in the twin bed beside her as he had previously done. She 
had been absolutely firm that he should make no alterations 
as regards his work on her account. 

“No, Alan,” she had said, when he had one day hinted 
that it would be possible for him to attend less regularly 
at the office. “No, Alan; if we once begin that kind of thing, 
we will never stop. You’ve got your work, and you’ve got 
to stick hard at it. I’m to make no difference to it. You’re 
to do exactly what you would have been doing if I . . . ” 
she broke off at that. “You understand, don’t you?” she 
added. 

Alan, it was decreed, therefore, left home in the morning 
at his usual time and returned in the evening when he 
had finished, and not before. But he never failed to call 
her up on the telephone at least twice during the day, 
and he was at pains so to arrange his work that he could 
always devote his evenings entirely to her. 

Their evenings they came to look upon as sacred to 
themselves. They asked no one to dinner and were resentful 
if the telephone bell rang. 

“Later on, we’ll entertain sometimes,” Christine said. 
“But not just yet. I seem to want you to myself more now 
than I ever did.” 

Alan nodded in complete and sympathetic understanding. 


108 


THE BURDEN 


She found herself watching the clock, and wondering 
how long it would be before she heard the click of his latch 
key in the lock and the sound of his cheerful whistle an¬ 
nouncing his return. But she checked herself in that. 

“A bad habit,” she told herself. “If I let myself do it now 
at six o’clock I shall soon be doing it at five, and after a 
while I shall be moping all the afternoon.” 

She forced occupations upon herself after tea. She read 
a book or wrote letters, or drew designs for fashion plates. 
She made up a list of the names of everybody who was 
likely to write to her or to come and see her. To each of 
them she wrote a brief letter of explanation of what had 
happened to her, and to each of them she ended: “I’d be 
delighted if you’d look me up or write. I’m always available 
from four o’clock till six, except on Saturdays and Sundays, 
and I love having letters. But if you come, or write, you 
must remember this. You are not to think of me as an 
invalid, and you are not to commiserate with me. That’s 
the one thing I can’t stand. You must just forget that I’m 
fixed to my chair. You won’t find it hard, really. I’m still 
quite^a cheerful person, you’ll discover.” 

This “circular letter” of hers, as she called it, was the 
upshot of the first few visits which she had received. 
People were kind or at least they meant to be kind. They 
brought her flowers, they entered the room with solemn 
expressions, and almost tiptoed across it to greet her. They 
spoke in a low voice. Several of the women threatened 
tears, and one did actually cry. Christine could not bear 
to be thus reminded of her affliction. Gloom, pity, outward 
sympathy upset her. She made frantic efforts to counteract 
the attitude of her visitors, even to the extent of distressing 
them in their turn, not only by alluding to her infirmity, 
but by actually forcing herself to treat it jocularly. But 
her efforts were a strain on her. She said to Alan afterwards: 

“I can’t have people here if they behave like that. It 
worries me—dreadfully. It makes me think about things, 
and that’s just what I mustn’t do. Why can’t they treat me 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 109 

as father doe*, or your people—naturally. I can be natural 
-why can’t they?" 

“Poor darling! You shan’t l>e worried, I imderstand," 
She clung to him a* he bent over her, 

“ft’s different with you, Alan, dear. I want to talk 
about It to you sometimes. But only to you , , , be- 
cause I know you understand," 

Her letters had their effect. Friend*, and acquaintances; 
began to drop In constantly to see her. And they were 
y/hat she was pleased to call “natural"—which meant, In 
reality, that they bid their pity for her by prodigious efforts 
i/; treat her as a young married woman, vigorous, healthy 
and entirely normal, from whom they v/ere receiving after¬ 
noon tea and the gossip of the day. 

I he general, altering the routine of his life—a tremen¬ 
dous affair this- to suit her convenience, was regular in 
attendance up'm her, 

“The best time for me to come is In the morning," he 
announced. “You-11 have other people in the afternoons, 
FJJ come Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays at twelve, and 
J1J stay to 1 inch on Fridays, How'll that do?" 

' Splendid, as far as I'm concerned, father. But what 
about your work? You always used to write in the 
mornings," 

“IVe aJtered my tiroes, that’s all, lie quite all right when 
I’m used to it, Soon shall be," 

He was as accurate to his time as a chronometer, and 
seemed to know exactly bow to treat her. Only once had 
he ever alluded to “things," as she called her tragedy. It 
was on the first occasion on which he saw her after the 
final verdict on her condition. It was then that he had put 
his hands on her shoulders, and looked keenly at her. 

■'US a bad do, this, Chris, old girl," he had said. “It’s 
hell for yon, \ know that. But you’re taking It as I might 
have known you would. When you -want my help, I’m ready 
—always. See?" 

Other popple came; Alan’s mother, fussily solicitous by 

nature, but having been forewarned by Alan, tactful enough 


110 


THE BURDEN 


to make her kindness unobtrusively effective. She would 
just sit and talk, patting Christine’s hand affectionately 
now and again, and rambling on placidly on the simple 
topics and interests which made up her life. Christine de¬ 
rived much quiet pleasure in encouraging her to talk about 
Alan. On the subject of Alan, Mrs. Carnes could become 
almost eloquent. Christine was content to listen, and to 
show her entire agreement with the volume of praise which 
poured from Mrs. Carnes like water from a tap. 

Laura Dumayne, whenever she was in London—and that 
was at least once a week—looked in on Christine. She 
retained her breezy, off-hand manner, and was evidently 
quite unaware of the antipathy which she had from the 
first inspired in her sister-in-law. 

“Well, old thing, how goes it?” she would say, lighting her 
cigarette, and dropping casually into a chair by Christine’s 
side. And she would launch into a slangy and amusing de¬ 
scription of her doings in a world which she seemed reluct¬ 
ant to take seriously. 

“The thing for you to do,” she said one day, “is to collect 
a ‘set’ round you. Instead of going about yourself, make 
people come to you. Have a sort of salon , I mean; not a 
‘highbrow’ one, though, but a crowd of cheery people, who’ll 
get into the habit of coming here because they like you 
and want to meet each other. I’ll chase some of my pals 
along if you like. Max Errington, for instance; he’s great 
fun. And Marion Follett—she’s a lady dressmaker, by 
the way, and might get you a job with your fashion drawing. 
Then there’s Guy Hyslop; cheery soul, he is. Jolly clever 
actor, too, I think. And he’s a perfect scream as a mimic. 
The Westrons, too. They always fit in anywhere. Oh, we’ll 
have some bright little parties later on!” 

Christine was grateful, genuinely grateful, but she pro¬ 
crastinated. She still wanted time “to get used to things”— 
such was her mental phrase. She was not sure that she 
desired “cheeriness” in Laura’s sense just yet. A deliberate 
burking of the main fact, her infirmity, yes—that was 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 111 

imperative; but she was scarcely as yet prepared for— 
gaiety. 

“Later on,” she answered Laura, “that would be kind of 
you, but just at the moment I’m rather full up. So many 
old friends of mine are clamouring to come and see me. 
I’ll let you know—later.” 

“Righto—any time,” said Laura casually. 

Christine had her visitors and her tea parties, her house¬ 
hold duties, her books and her drawing, and her evenings 
alone with Alan. Her days were occupied, as fully occupied 
as she could make them, and it was seldom that she found 
herself with the time or even the inclination to brood upon 
hopes that were buried, or upon the past, with its memories 
of physical activities shared with Alan. With all the effort 
of will of which she was capable—and her capabilities were 
considerable—she had concentrated herself upon one objec¬ 
tive. Her behaviour, the organisation of her life, her plans 
for herself, her very thoughts, were all subordinate to her 
determination not to be a drag upon Alan. She had set her 
mind to the task of so contriving matters that she would 
be to Alan the wife that she had meant to be in every 
particular save the one that was physically impossible. 
She would never be, she had told herself, the invalid bravely 
but wanly smiling in spite of a great affliction, but she 
would always be her old vigorous self in everything except 
her inability to move. She took immense pains to keep 
herself up to date in the affairs of the outside world and 
alive to all the interests which she and Alan had in common. 
She realised that she must prove herself even more of a 
mental companion to him than she had been before. She 
showed an intense eagerness to be allowed to share with 
her mind at least in all his activities. She encouraged him 
to tell her, at length and in detail, everything that he said 
and did and even thought when he was away from her. 
She made him describe the progress of his work to her, 
made him explain it, and made him talk to her constantly 
of his plans and schemes and ambitions for the future. She 
developed, or so it seemed to the delighted Alan, an almost 


112 


THE BURDEN 


uncanny power of visualising, as she sat at home with him in 
the evenings, the changing appearance of the Chingford 
village as it grew, house by house and stone by stone, from 
day to day. 

But in spite of her will-power, and in spite of the multi¬ 
tude of interests and occupations with which she had sur¬ 
rounded herself, she had periodically her moods of black 
depression. She knew that deep in her soul there lurked a 
devil of bitter disappointment, and she was in constant 
dread lest that devil should show himself to any one, but 
more particularly to Alan. At all costs, Alan must not guess 
more than she chose to tell him. Purposely she allowed her¬ 
self to be a little plaintive to him sometimes in order that 
he might, in comforting her, be convinced that he retained 
the power so to do. 

The coming of spring made her feel her position more 
acutely. She was almost angry with the grass in their little 
garden for taking on a brighter hue, with the trees for 
putting out their buds, with the crocuses for pushing up 
their smiles towards the sun. A gangway of boards had 
been made and was placed every morning over the front 
door steps so that she could run her chair into the garden 
when she chose. She took to spending as much time as she 
could in the open air. But there was the bitterness of frus¬ 
tration in her heart as she sat there listening to the sparrows 
chattering their love-talk and watching the spring clouds 
chasing each other over an April sky. 

She was sitting there one Saturday morning waiting for 
Alan to come home for lunch. Saturday afternoons were 
always a treat for her, because, instead of being pushed 
laboriously through Kensington in her “street-chair,” as 
she called it, for a meagre hour by her companion-nurse, 
as on ordinary afternoons, she would be conducted vigor¬ 
ously by an energetic Alan through the gardens and the 
park for at least two hours. But on this particular day, 
almost summer-like in its warmth, the devil within her 
had been more than usually active. Her fate had seemed 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 113 

particularly hard to bear. She was—she almost admitted 
it to herself—feeling peevish. 

She picked up her book as she heard Alan’s key in the 
garden gate. “He mustn’t see I’m down,” was her instinctive 
thought. 

“Well, and how’s my Chris?” He dropped his hat and 
attache case on the grass at her feet. “Ripping day, isn’t 
it?” he added, and mopped his forehead. 

“I’m all right. I’ve been rather lazy this morning,” she 
smiled cheerfully. “It’s too hot for you to drag me about 
this afternoon, darling.” 

“I’m not going to. Got something better for you. What 
about a motor drive?” 

“But, Alan . . . it’s not possible. It’s ...” 

“Oh! yes it is—now. I saw Rayford some time ago, and 
he said it would be all right if you weren’t jolted and could 
be properly supported. I’ve had the inside of the car 
altered to suit you—special springing and a special sort of 
couch thing. Little surprise for you. Say you’re pleased.” 

But she was not pleased. Her black mood had not left 
her; it had only been momentarily suppressed, and it rose 
up again now like a menacing shadow. 

“Oh! Alan dear, it’s ripping of you to have thought of it, 
but somehow—I rather dread the thought of going in the 
car again—just yet, anyway. I . . . hate it . . . it’s 
spoilt everything for me, don’t you see? Even to see it would 
remind me of all that’s—finished now. Oh! I can’t, I 
can’t, Alan.” 

He was down beside her in a second, and he saw that she 
was crying. 

“Chris, darling, it’s all right. Of course you shan’t go— 
not till you feel like it, and never if you don’t want to. 
I’m a stupid, thoughtless fool, that’s what I am, ever to 
have suggested it. We’ll have a real long walk instead, 
shall we? I could do with a bit of hard exercise, too.” 

“You are an understanding dear,” she declared, and 
rubbed her wet cheek against the back of his hand. Inside 
the house the gong rang for lunch. 


114 


THE BURDEN 


“I’ll run up and wash—shan’t be a minute,” he said. He 
did not offer to wheel her in. Long ago he had learnt that- 
she hated any one to do for her what she could do for herself. 
He hurried on in front, leaving the door open for her. But 
as he was getting ready for lunch he was asking himself an 
anxious question. 

“Why—why did she take it like that?” 

He had been puzzled by her sudden outburst. It was 
unusual and very unlike her. He had expected her to be 
overjoyed at the prospect of being able to get right out 
into the country with him. Surely she ought to be delighted 
that it would now be possible for her to have additional 
interests out of doors. 

“She must have been moping a bit,” he decided—and 
pulled himself up short at the thought. 

“Moping—but my God! she mustn’t be allowed to mope. 
It’s a short cut to hell for both of us if she does.” 

He had a sudden vision of a future filled with alarming, 
dangerous possibilities. 

“No, by God!” he muttered. He went downstairs whis¬ 
tling cheerfully. 


CHAPTER TWELVE 



HRISTINE had vowed that she would never allow 


herself to be a drag on Alan. But he, for his part, 
had made his own vows too. He had dedicated himself, as 
it were, to Christine’s service. In all sincerity, he had set 
before him an ideal, and sworn in his heart to live up to 
that ideal. He liked to regard himself, in fancy, as a self- 
sacrificing worshipper at the throne of his stricken queen. 
Rayford’s words to him on that terrible afternoon when the 
verdict was given were engraved upon his mind. He meant 
to devote his whole life to the inspiring task of “making 
things less hard for her.” 

He knew from the first that the task would be a hard 
one—how hard he realised more and more as the weeks, 
and then the months went by. But he faced it enthusiastic¬ 
ally, putting the vigour of his personality into all his efforts 
to keep Christine cheerful, amused, occupied, interested in 
life as she was able to lead it. He tried his utmost to 
banish self and his own inclinations and to consider her, 
primarily, if not quite exclusively, in everything. He made 
it his principle that, where she was concerned, no trouble 
could conceivably be too great and no detail too insignifi¬ 
cant. And that implied sacrifices. He was a man who not 
only enjoyed physical exercise, but needed it. But now 
he gave it up almost entirely in order to remain with Chris¬ 
tine during his week-end leisure, and as a result he returned 
to his office each Monday morning vaguely conscious that 
he was not feeling so fit as he always used to feel at the 
beginning of the week. And he, too, experienced an occa¬ 
sional mood of dark depression, carefully hidden from 
Christine, when the future loomed blank and monotonous; 
and long—damnably long. But he chased that mood from 


115 


THE BURDEN 


116 

him, as a gardener chases a destructive cat away from a 
flower-bed bright with blossom. He was nurturing with 
devoted care his delicate bloom, his ideal of great self- 
sacrificing love; and no depression, no pessimistic thoughts 
about the future should be allowed to creep stealthily in 
to crush it or bruise it. There was, moreover, he reminded 
himself, his work. His ambitions were no less, because 
domestic disaster had come upon him. Christine was ambi¬ 
tious for him, Christine fostered his hopes, encouraged him 
to aim high, forced him to believe in his own powers. 
Christine wanted him to be a conspicuous success on the 
line which he had chosen. His success would bring happiness 
to her. Whatever he did, he was doing primarily for her 
sake. 

“Work, work!” he told himself. “It can be made a 
compensation for much, for almost anything, perhaps. ...” 

It was the beginning of the hot, dry summer of 1921. 
Tempers in England were being highly tried; by the folly 
of the miners in striking, by the folly of the other unions 
in the triple alliance in not backing them up and forcing a 
reckless Government to its senses over the industrial out¬ 
look; by the folly of the Government in raising a defence 
force as an instigation to revolution, or by the folly of the 
Government in not using the machine guns of that defence 
force to wipe out the English “Bolshies”; by the heat and 
the dislocation of trade and high prices, and general pessi¬ 
mism, and by the curtailment of the water supply and by 
several hundred other exasperating facts. 

Alan’s temper was as highly tried as that of most people. 
All was not well at the Chingford village. Work had not 
stopped, but it was going only slowly. The country was 
palpably in a state of tension, “money was tight” they said 
in the City. Everything was unsettled; people were reluct¬ 
ant to take risks; people were extremely reluctant to part 
with capital, even to the extent of investing it in desirable 
villa residences on the Chingford Estate. Old Mr. Carnes 
was anxious. He even succeeded in making Alan anxious. 

“Damned, short-sighted fools,” he said—of the Govern- 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


117 


ment. “Haven’t I always said they’d sit on the safety valve 
too long? And now look at the mess the country’s in. We 
want peace and quiet, so as to settle down. We must have it 
or well get busted. Peace, Retrenchment, Reform—it’s an 
old formula but a mighty good one. If people can’t see 
some sort of security, we won’t persuade ’em to give a bit 
extra for these houses of ours. And we’ve got a lot o’ 
money sunk there, Alan boy.” 

Alan was worried. He had a great deal of work to do 
involving a large number of details which required his vigi¬ 
lant attention. He was a person perfectly capable of stand¬ 
ing an abnormal strain in normal times and in normal cir¬ 
cumstances. But neither the times nor the circumstances 
were normal and he was beginning to notice the fact. It 
was being borne in upon him that, apart from the incidentals 
of business and trade—troublesome at any time but par¬ 
ticularly so at the moment—he had other cause for worry. 
All was not perfectly to his satisfaction at “The White 
Cottage.” He could not explain his feelings about the 
matter even to himself, but he was conscious of a subtle 
permeation of the atmosphere, as though by some poison, 
so faint and so nearly unnoticeable as to be almost innocu¬ 
ous. Yet . . . readjustment to altered conditions was 
complete, or as complete as it ever could be. The house¬ 
hold—he himself and Christine, the companion-nurse, their 
servants, their relations—had created a routine and had 
established a normal. Use, custom, habit, had evolved them¬ 
selves and spun their patterned web. The organisation 
worked, functioned. They had unquestionably made the best 
of things. But use, custom, habit, it suddenly occurred 
to him , had, under these constricted conditions, brought in 
their train—monotony. 

The creative part of his work interested him, fascinated 
him to the temporary exclusion of all other thoughts what¬ 
ever. But much of his work was not creative, but purely a 
matter of irritating routine and detail—monotonous, in 
fact. He came home tired in the evenings, desirous of 
nothing so much as food for his body and rest for his mind. 


THE BURDEN 


118 

But he knew that it was his part always to appear cheerful 
and enthusiastic and vigorous, in order that Christine might 
be kept equally cheerful and enthusiastic and alert. He 
had to soothe and to cheer when what he most needed was 
to be himself soothed and cheered. He had to rouse himself 
to an effort when his energy was at its lowest ebb. He 
had to make a story, an interesting or amusing story, out 
of a day which had largely consisted of boring, insignificant 
trifles, or he had to recount the details of some important 
piece of work upon which he had been engaged for several 
hours, and from the consideration of which his brain im¬ 
peratively demanded a rest. He had to disguise his fatigue 
under a cloak of cheerfulness: he had to be bright to order. 
And he had to listen: he had to assume, under the watchful 
look of eyes which knew every shade of expression on his 
features, an eager interest in all the comparatively trivial 
events of Christine’s day—her household affairs, the con¬ 
tents of her letters, her father’s gossip, her visitors, her 
opinion on a book or a newspaper article. These things 
did, in the normal way, interest him. He had an enormous, 
and perhaps an exaggerated, opinion of Christine’s judg¬ 
ment and her critical faculty, and her powers of acute 
observation. But he found it quite extraordinarily difficult 
to concentrate his mind upon them when his mind was 
exhausted with a full day’s work, and when, moreover, 
Christine’s own mental state was not infrequently bordering 
upon that of peevish captiousness—not with him, but with 
the world in general. 

In earlier days he would have been perfectly frank with 
Christine: this was just one of the situations when the 
mental frankness of which they had both been so proud 
would have been invaluable. He would have approached 
her directly and said: 

“Look here, Chris, there’s a little something growing up 
between you and me. Things aren’t quite as they should be. 
We’re both conscious of it, I can see that. Let’s put it right 
straight away.” 

They would have faced the matter honestly and the strain 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


119 


would have been at once relaxed. All would have been 
happily well again. But now he could not conceive himself 
saying to her: 

“I say, you know, I find it awfully difficult to be bright 
in the evenings. I’m tired, and it’s rather wearying having 
to recount to you everything I’ve done all day. And then, 
too, I find your doings rather trivial and not always awfully 
interesting—just at that moment anyway. That’s my 
trouble. Now tell me your side. I expect there’s something 
irritating you, too.” 

He simply could not say that, or anything like it. It 
would be an exaggeration (he maintained to himself), and 
it would be cruel as well. He knew how she loved their 
evenings together, how she looked forward to them all day. 
It was not her fault. If it was anybody’s fault it was his 
own for having allowed himself to be inconsiderate. He 
ascribed his lapse to his mental state. He was worrying 
over his work and his mind was not as fresh as it should 
be. But to keep his mind fresh, and so to keep his resolution 
up to standard, he needed more exercise. He came back 
to that opinion again and again. 

He experienced a sudden longing for the conversation of 
an intelligent man. He sounded Christine on the subject, 
explaining tactfully that she must not for a moment think 
he wanted to get away from her, but that it was just that 
he really needed the exercise. She was responsive at once. 

“Why, of course, Alan dear! It would do you a world 
of good, I’m sure. I mustn’t be selfish and expect you to 
give up all your spare time sitting cooped up with me. It’s 
dull for you, darling.” 

(Was there, he wondered, just the faintest hint of re¬ 
proach in her voice? “It’s dull for you, darling.”) 

“I thought of asking Norman Vaizey if he’d come for a 
long walk with me this Saturday,” he announced. 

“Oh, not this Saturday, please! I did want you at home 
then. I’ve got a tea party. Several people coming that I 
want you to meet. Laura is bringing the Errington man, 
and I do want to know what you think of him. And Marion 


THE BURDEN 


120 

Follett. She’s the woman I told you about who might be 
able to get me a job with my drawing. Do be here, Alan 
dearest.” 

He smiled and kissed her tenderly. “Why, of course I 
will,” he answered. “I can go with Norman any old 
Saturday.” 

He was pleased to be able to make this little sacrifice 
for her, but he was disappointed too. He did not care 
about meeting these people and he had set his heart on a 
long, invigorating walk. . . . 

Alan did not enjoy the tea party. It was a warm, sunny 
day, but there was a breeze—a delightful day to be tramping 
the Downs. But he kept thrusting his regrets to the back 
of his mind and saying to himself: “It’s to please her, bless 
her! And that’s what matters.” 

Laura, of whom he was fond in a vague, brotherly way, 
but of whom he was also extremely critical, was at her 
worst. She was showily dressed and she was showing off 
both her dress and her ability to be smartly, and to him 
irritatingly, daring in her behaviour. She came with Max 
Errington. He knew Errington slightly and disliked him. 
The man, in Alan’s opinion, was almost too much the perfect 
gentleman. He was rather under forty, but a streak or 
two of grey in his hair and a tendency towards stoutness 
made him look older than he was. He was well dressed 
and well informed. One could not call him conceited, but 
one could easily be annoyed at his complete self-assurance. 
His affability and his self-assurance were almost obtrusive. 
He had, as Alan knew, something of a reputation as a man 
who was exceedingly attractive to women and who was 
prepared to benefit by his power of attraction. He also 
had, as Alan also knew, a wife, from whom he was separated. 
He and Laura, Alan noticed, seemed to know each other 
well enough to be chaffingly and frivolously intimate. Laura, 
talking and laughing loudly, was the centre of a little group 
round the tea table. Christine was in the group, but some¬ 
how not quite of it. 

“Not her sort of people really, these,” thought Alan, and, 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


121 


having done his duty with the cake plates and the tea-cups, 
he attached himself to Ursula Flack. He rather liked Ursula, 
who was an old school friend of Christine’s; an eager person 
with dark eyes and dark, bobbed hair and an intense way 
of looking at one when she spoke. She affected the vivid 
style in dress, liked to be thought Bohemian, and played the 
’cello really well. She was a student at the Royal College 
of Music, and was quite ready to adopt the attitude that 
persons who were not interested in music could scarcely be 
said to count. She had recently escaped from the care of 
well-to-do and stodgily conventional parents, and was living 
on her own in lodgings—that being, in her opinion, the first 
step towards working out a career for herself. She liked 
to explain her situation by saying with a sharp smile: “I’m 
living apart from my parents, you know.” 

“I do think Christine is simply splendid,” she whispered 
to Alan. “One would never know. ...” But he inter¬ 
rupted her. He hated mention of Christine’s helplessness. 

“I’m quite out of my depth here,” he confessed. “I 
don’t know who half these people are. Who’s the business¬ 
like little woman talking to Chris now?” 

“Mrs. Follett—Marion Follett. She’s the Sloane Street 
dressmaker. Ernestine is her trade name. And you may 
very well say she looks business-like. She is. Nobody more 
so. She’s got brains, too, in her own line, but only in her 
own line. No culture; or, at least, her idea of a cultured 
mind is a well-clothed body.” 

“A neat label,” said Alan, smiling and looking across at 
Mrs. Follett, who at that moment was examining some of 
Christine’s fashion designs. 

“Yes, I like some of these,” Alan heard her say. “Good 
lines about them. May I take one or two with me to con¬ 
sider?” 

In her offhand way, Laura chipped into the conversation. 
“You’d better watch her, Chris, my dear,” she said, laughing. 
“Get ’em copyrighted, or whatever it is first. Otherwise 
she’ll snatch your ideas.” 

“Our Ernestine is above suspicion,” declared Errington, 


THE BURDEN 


122 

with a mock bow towards Mrs. Follett. “At any rate when 
there are witnesses, as in this case/’ he added, and raised 
an easy laugh. 

A tall and slim young man with the wide, mobile mouth 
of a comedian and light check trousers, miraculously 
creased, played revue music on the piano and talked across 
the room to Laura (whom he called “old thing”) while he 
was playing. 

“ ’Member Robey in this bit?” he would ask, and would 
sing a line or two of some song, with his features and his 
voice suddenly becoming extraordinarily like those of Robey. 
Everybody laughed and clapped, and there were calls of 
“Go on, Guy, do some more!” The young man hitched his 
trousers an inch higher, displaying lilac silk socks, and 
complied. 

“Rotten stuff!” declared Ursula Flack to Alan. “He 
wastes his talents. He’s got a beautiful touch.” 

“Guy Hyslop, isn’t it? He’s a jolly clever mimic.” 

“Oh, yes. And a good sort too. I like him. He’s got 
taste. But it’s so seldom one can get him to be serious 
over anything. Pity he sticks to revue . He could do some 
good in straight parts I believe.” 

Noise; noise and a certain inane determination to “keep 
things going”—that was how the party impressed itself 
upon Alan. 

“Lord!” he thought. “If Chris weren’t like she is, she’d 
be bored to tears with all this.” He glanced towards her. 
She caught his eye and smiled encouragingly. There was a 
little circle round her chair; amongst them Max Errington, 
bending over her and making himself agreeable. 

Ronny Dumayne arrived. 

“Ha! My faithful bread-winner,” Laura greeted him. 
“Oil market active, I see by the paper, Ron. Which means 
that you’ve made enough money to-day to give me a nice 
little dinner in town.” Ronny smiled his rather sinister 
smile. 

“Righto!” he agreed. “But it must have been yester¬ 
day’s paper you saw. The Stock Exchange doesn’t function 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 123 

on Saturday, my good Laura. Are you coming home 
to-night, by the way?” 

“No. Got a room at the club. I hate that last train. 
Ill get Max to motor me down to-morrow. Max, here a 
minute! You’re just aching to drive me home to-morrow and 
have lunch, aren’t you?” 

“Well . . . ” he began. 

“Oh, stuff! Of course you can. And play golf with 
Ronny afterwards.” 

Babble! Babble! And Alan was watching Ronny’s face 
and noting his expression. Obviously Ronny was not 
pleased. 

“Laura can be pretty trying,” thought Alan. He had a 
sudden heart-ache; Chris and himself—how different they 
had been, were still, in spite of everything. God! the pity 
of it! the hellish tragedy of it! 

People drifted away—noisily for the most part. It was 
nearly seven o’clock before Alan and Christine were alone. 

“Very noble of you, dear,” she said, “to stick it out so 
well. You were bored, I expect, but you don’t show it— 
at least, not awfully much.” 

“Well, I can’t say I was very enthusiastic. They’re 
rather loud, these people, don’t you think, Chris? They 
. . . they cackle.” 

“They’re kind-hearted though, and cheery.” 

“Yes, but . . . ” He hesitated. 

“But what?” 

“Oh, I don’t know. I suppose it is that that sort of inane 
‘cheeriness’ gets on my nerves. Do you see what I mean?” 

“I should have thought you would have been grateful 
to people who’d taken the trouble to come here to make 
things a little less dull for me.” 

She did not really care about these new friends of hers, 
but she was tired after a long afternoon and so was ready 
to resent his criticism. But he, too, was inclined to be 
irritable; he had given up his walk and he had been annoyed 
by the free-and-easy way “a drove of idlers” (it was thus 
he thought of them) had taken possession of his house. 


THE BURDEN 


124 

“But I am grateful; of course I am/’ he answered, “only 
I can’t help wishing that they were rather more ‘useful’ 
persons, that’s all. We always used to agree, didn’t we, 
that we disliked that type?” 

“Your own sister is pretty representative, anyway.” The 
words were almost a sneer, and Alan was conscious that 
they were meant to sting. He controlled himself. 

“Oh, Laura! That’s just her pose. She’s all right, really. 
Full of sense.” 

“She conceals it fairly successfully, I must say. . . . 
But Alan, I nearly forgot to tell you. Mrs. Follett was 
awfully nice about my drawings. She’s a dressmaker, you 
know. She says she may be able to give me a job later 
on. Won’t that be splendid?” 

“Rather! You’d love to have some definite occupation, 
wouldn’t you?” 

He was trying hard to share her enthusiasm and to show 
her that he was interested. But at the moment he was 
almost indifferent. “Fashion-plates! ” he thought. “A pretty 
little job. And she isn’t any good at them, really. She’ll 
get disappointed and then things will be worse.” He was 
scarcely aware that Christine’s words about Laura were still 
rankling in his mind. Moreover, he was himself uneasy 
about this free-and-easy sister of his. 

“Alan,” she said suddenly, “do you think there’s anything 
between Laura and Max Errington? They struck me as 
being pretty . . . well, familiar with each other.” 

It had been his own thought, and he was anxious. But 
he was annoyed that Christine should seem so ready to be 
suspicious. 

“I suppose your father has put that idea back into your 
head.” His tone was very nearly bitter. He glanced sharply 
at her and saw the hurt look in her eyes. He felt suddenly 
ashamed. With an arm round her shoulder he bent his 
face to hers. 

“I’m sorry, darling Chris. That was a rotten thing to 
say. Please forget it—and forgive me. Will you?” 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 125 

“Yes—of course. It doesn’t matter, Alan. And it served 
me right for making comments on your sister.” 

Yet she meant him to know, from the dull, spiritless in¬ 
tonation of her words, that she was not appeased. And 
he did know it. 

“Laura’s straight enough,” he said quietly. He kissed 
her on the forehead. “Time we dressed for dinner,” he 
remarked. 


CHAPTER THIRTEEN 


I GUST came, as relentlessly blazing hot as had been 



IX the July of this most surprising of English summers. 
Alan wanted to take Christine out of London for a month 
or so, but she declined to go. She would loathe to be in a 
hotel or rooms, she declared, where she would be subjected 
to the inquisitive pity of strangers; and when Alan urged 
upon her his conviction that she needed a change, she be¬ 
came irritable. 

“Oh, please don’t worry me, Alan,” she said. “I don’t 
want to go away. Surely that’s enough, isn’t it?” 

He had his misgivings. She was not ill, but, watching her 
attentively, he was sure that she was not as well as she 
had been. She was fretful, captious, almost nervy. Obviously 
she was a prey to her moods. She would be listless and ap¬ 
parently uninterested in anything for hours on end; then 
would come a fit of restless energy, when she would make 
an elaborate tour of inspection of the whole house and 
upset the servants by her sharp criticisms, or when she 
would work at her drawing for too long and get a headache, 
or would demand to be taken out in her street chair at an 
unusual or an inconvenient time. She would be irritable 
and almost rude to Alan, and then, filled with remorse, would 
be tearful and fond; she would mope for a while and then 
suddenly brighten up and be cheerful and active again. 
But she invariably managed to tire herself out. 

He bore with her because he loved her devotedly. But 
he had become aware that their difficulties were increasing 
and he was worried. He consulted Rayford, but was only 
partially reassured. It was the specialist’s opinion that 
this was merely a phase which would pass. 

“There’s an active, vigorous mind cooped up in a supine 


126 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


127 


body,” he said. “We must give the mind time to adapt 
itself to the physical handicap, to accept the handicap 
as the normal. Do you follow me?” 

Alan understood, but he was not satisfied. Such might 
be the explanation, but it did not lessen the difficulties of 
the situation. There were details which he had not chosen 
to discuss with Rayford. Rayford had talked of her active, 
vigorous mind. But he, Alan, felt that her mind was less 
vigorous and active than it had been. She was losing her 
interest in anything serious and becoming more and more 
absorbed in the coterie of friends with which Laura had 
provided her. Alan disliked these friends. They did her 
no good, he felt, with their exasperating “cheeriness.” They 
did her harm: they exhausted her. And sometimes they 
made mischief. 

He recalled a scene which he had recently had with 
Christine. She was exacting in making him tell her of his 
doings, and if she happened to be in a peevish mood could 
be irritatingly critical. Hence he sometimes omitted to tell 
her things—not from any necessity for concealment, but 
simply in order to save himself trouble and to avoid a pos¬ 
sible “fuss.” It had happened that he had been abruptly 
dismissive in his office to a man who had annoyed him on 
some business matter. The man, it chanced, was a friend 
of Max Errington, and it further chanced that Max, in his 
airy way, had produced the story of Alan’s “firmness,” 
much embroidered, at one of Christine’s tea parties. 

She had assailed Alan afterwards. Why was she to be 
placed in the ignominious position of hearing this sort of 
thing from an outsider? There had been malice under Max’s 
chaff, she could tell that. She had had to sit there and 
listen to ridicule of her own husband, because she was in 
ignorance of the facts of the case. 

“Why must you be so secretive?” she had demanded. 
“You usen’t to be at one time when ...” 

“That will do, Chris,” he had interrupted her sharply. 
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. Didn’t think it important, I 
suppose. But I resent these gossiping friends of yours being 


128 THE BURDEN 

the cause of a row between you and me. What the devil 
has it got to do with Max Errington anyway?” 

They had bickered over the matter at length—stupidly, 
as he was ready enough to admit, when the inevitable recon¬ 
ciliation took place. But the incident had left its mark. 
Yet it would have been absurd to have discussed it in detail 
with Rayford. Equally absurd to have mentioned another 
matter which caused him uneasiness—the influence of the 
general over Christine. Alan seldom Saw the general, but 
he was made continually aware of his existence by Christine, 
whose moods seemed to be affected by her father’s visits to 
her. Alan did not suspect his father-in-law of deliberately 
maligning him. The general would never say to Christine: 
“Your husband is neglecting you now that you are an 
invalid. All he cares for is his work.” But he would be 
capable, so Alan thought, of hinting as much, and, further, 
of hinting at an offer to be pugnacious on her behalf. It 
was obvious, conspicuously so, from phrases that came 
from Christine when she was irritable or depressed, that her 
father was insidiously and persistently suggesting to her 
that she might be happier than she was. Alan had had proof 
of the old man’s jealousy and he mistrusted him. But he 
was not neglecting Christine; he was, on the contrary, doing 
all that lay in his power to make her life easy. He did not 
care only for his work—in spite of what the general might 
insinuate. 

His mind turned then to the question of his work. He 
did care for it, enormously, and he was disappointed. The 
trade slump was at its worst and work upon the Chingford 
village was being curtailed. Reluctantly old Mr. Carnes 
had cut down the rate of construction to one-fourth, declar¬ 
ing that the firm must “go dead slow and bidjb its time.” 
Alan knew well enough that his father was wise, but he 
was eager to see his village completed to an artistic whole, 
and he had hoped that so much would come from this first 
opportunity of his. He had hoped to become increasingly 
busy upon increasingly important work, but, instead of 
that, he had little to do. And he hated idleness. Moreover, 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


129 


situated as he was, with an invalid wife and many worries, 
he was afraid of it. To keep himself occupied he decided to 
write a comprehensive book on village planning. He began 
with characteristic energy and zest, and was soon absorbed 
in it. But in this, again, he found himself confronted with 
the irritating circumstances of his home. Christine was as 
enthusiastic as he was at first, but gradually her interest 
seemed to wane. Soon she took exception to his working at 
home after dinner. 

“Oh, bother the old book!’ , she would say. “I’ve been 
without you all day, Alan. Do leave it and talk to me till I 
go to bed.” 

He complied cheerfully enough. But it meant that he 
could not settle down to it till half-past ten or so. He 
worked late and then slept badly. He was irritable in the 
mornings in consequence. Then she begged him not to sit 
up late. 

“Come to bed when I do sometimes,” she pleaded. “I do 
so love lying still and talking to you in the dark—inti¬ 
mately, as we always used to do.” 

But frequently when she had persuaded him thus, she 
would be tired herself and would drop off to sleep five min¬ 
utes after she was in bed, leaving him lying tfyere wide 
awake and longing to be back at his work. 

“It’s difficult—it’s all infernally difficult,” he would think 
to himself, twisting restlessly from side to side, unable to 
sleep, unable to take his mind off the accumulation of his 
worries. Then he would prop himself on one elbow and 
look down at her, sleeping peacefully in the bed drawn 
close to his. Her parted lips, the gentle rise and fall of 
her breast as she breathed, her hair spread over the pillow 
like a dark cloud—how often had he not woken in the night 
in the old care-free days when they had first occupied those 
beds and looked at her thus and worshipped her beauty! 
“But it’s yours, it’s all yours, only beloved,” she had been 
wont to say. 

“Chris, my Chris, I’ll be faithful to you. It’s the least I 
can do, my poor darling.” 


THE BURDEN 


130 

He had been faithful, rigidly faithful, in deed and word 
and thought for what was now nearly a year since the acci¬ 
dent. In word and in deed, yes. But in thought? He was a 
man, young, vigorous, virile. Nature took no account of 
his situation and no account of his vows. Nature had her 
claims upon him and pressed them. Thoughts had been 
creeping stealthily upon him lately—evil thoughts which, 
in shame, he thrust angrily back. But they recurred. They 
recurred persistently, they attacked him indirectly and in¬ 
sidiously when he was least expecting them. He had 
become watchful, he had braced himself to check them and 
to repel them, and then, realising that an effort, a distinct 
effort of will, was required of him for their repulsion, he had 
come to know fear—of himself. 

Christine desired to give a dinner party. She pestered 
Alan on the matter until, against his judgment, he gave in. 
Previously their entertaining had been limited to gatherings 
of Christine’s friends for tea, or to inviting Alan’s parents 
or her father, or (once or twice) Laura to lunch or dinner. 
But Christine now expressed a wish to “launch out a bit,” 
as she said, and show that she was “a normal person and 
not an object for commiseration.” She even suggested that 
the dinner should be arranged for the 2nd October, the 
anniversary of the accident, “to prove that I’ve got over it.” 
But to that Alan was firm in his objection. 

“No, Chris,” he said; “people would think it sheer 
bravado—and rather horrible too. I won’t consent to that.” 
He was opposed to the party in any case, for he was sure 
that Christine’s health and nerves would suffer both in the 
preparations for it and in the actual excitement of the eve¬ 
ning. But she was so eager and so persistent that he 
acquiesced. 

There were six guests, all, with the exception of Norman 
Vaizey, friends of Christine rather than of Alan. Marion 
Follett was asked because she had been obliging in the 
matter of getting Christine commissions to do drawings. 
Alan disliked her, but, nevertheless, had her on his right at 
dinner, where he quickly discovered that, though she said 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


131 


little that seemed to be of the slightest importance, she 
was obviously very alert and observant. On his other side 
Ursula Flack discussed the educational value of the prome¬ 
nade concerts with Vaizey. The remaining three were the 
Westron pair and Eric Lunham. The Westrons had been 
described by Laura as people who would “fit in anywhere.” 
They did, being comparatively harmless and not aggressively 
intelligent. Alan, who had met them once before, had 
summed them up in his own mind as being palpably bored 
with each other and not really interested in anything except 
in the task of killing time. Ralph Westron was polished 
but superficial; he was on the verge of becoming a young- 
middle-aged bore, but still seemed to fancy himself as 
something of a gallant with women. His wife, Olive, knew 
that her thirties were slipping past and was trying to hide 
the fact under too much make-up, but there was that in 
her eyes which rather suggested to Alan that if she had 
married a better man she might have made something more 
of her life. Somehow he felt sorry for her. Eric Lunham 
he rather liked, in spite of a vague suspicion of him as 
belonging to “the set.” He was a weakling, short, slight and 
pale, with a soothing voice and quiet manners; essentially 
a restful person, more at home in a drawing-room than in 
a man’s club, popular with women, not as a potential lover, 
but as a sympathetic friend who would understand those 
minor troubles which the ordinary man would be apt to 
regard as mere feminine “fussiness.” Alan liked him because 
he could upon occasion talk sense, because his very gentle¬ 
ness seemed to be something of a check on the riotous 
loudness of the rest of the coterie, and because, in a patently 
innocuous way, he was a genuinely devoted and tender 
admire!’ of Christine’s. 

The dinner undoubtedly went well. Christine had spent 
the greater part of two days on her preparations and the 
result was surprisingly good. Flattering comments were 
made on the charming appearance of the room, on the taste¬ 
fully simple decoration of the table, on the arrangement 
of the flowers. Christine, in a bright blue dress, cut low 


THE BURDEN 


132 

and without sleeves, had made herself up with exceptional 
skill. She was exhilarated, almost excited. 

“Poor child!” thought Alan, watching her surreptitiously 
from his end of the table. It gave him a queer feeling of 
sadness to remember that this was the first time he had 
ever seen Christine acting as hostess on anything like a large 
scale. There had been the first four months after their 
marriage when they had been so absorbed in each other 
that they had postponed such functions as this for the 
time being: and then ... it had not been possible. He 
was astonished at her; at her vivaciousness and her power to 
charm; at the way she had organised the whole affair, 
and at the way she was making it go. Conversation 
never flagged and was agreeably varied—largely, as he 
noticed, by her skilful manipulation. Their guests seemed to 
be thoroughly enjoying themselves, and, moreover—a mark 
of the clever hostess this—seemed to be displaying them¬ 
selves at their very best. Thus Marion Follett became less 
sharp and business-like; Ursula dropped music for a while 
and listened while Vaizey talked of books in relation to 
life, and even the Westrons displayed an animation that 
did not depend entirely upon inconsequential small talk. 
There was laughter and chaff—plenty of it—but there was 
as well, or so it seemed to Alan, something that might more 
definitely be called an atmosphere of mutual interest. Chris¬ 
tine’s personality had been responsible for the creation of 
that atmosphere. 

“It’s her role, this,” he thought. “Well, she needn’t be 
deprived of this pleasure, at any rate, thank God!” 

Dinner was over, but they sat on together round the 
table with their coffee and liqueurs. Ralph Westron was a 
man who liked to do himself well at table and he had 
done so on this occasion. When the decanters passed him 
for the second time he helped himself generously to more 
old brandy. He sipped it and talked more affably than 
ever. He was not in the least drunk, but his flushed face, 
and the heightening of his tone, made it evident that he 
felt very comfortable and very sure of himself. He was 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


133 


describing to Christine how he had recently been inveigled 
into playing golf with three men very much above his own 
standard. 

“ ’Course I’m hopeless,” he said, “and those fellers got 
really cross with me. Not my fault, though; I warned ’em.” 
He went on to recount, not without humour, the idiosyn¬ 
crasies and the impatience of the scratch player in such 
circumstances. Then he appeared to remember something. 

“But o’ course,” he said, “I’m being funny to the wrong 
person. You had a bit of a reputation yourself, Mrs. Carnes, 
hadn’t you?” 

“I was very keen,” said Christine. 

Alan, listening, tried to catch Westron’s eye. This might 
easily become a dangerous conversation. But Westron him¬ 
self suddenly realised his want of tact. Confused, he forgot 
for the moment the rule of the house—that expressions of 
pity were forbidden. 

“Oh! I am sorry,” he said quickly. “What a thoughtless 
fool you must consider me! But, you know, you hide every¬ 
thing so cleverly that one really forgets that you can’t . . . 
I mean ... By Jove! Mrs. Carnes, I do admire your 
pluck. You’re simply wonderful, and it must be just rotten 
for you. You see, I . . . ” 

The others had been talking hard, trying to head him off. 
Vaizey, next him, had been nudging him; his own wife 
from across the table had been making signals to him. But 
he had been entirely oblivious until now, when it was too 
late. 

There was a sharp little “Oh!” from Christine—almost 
as though she had suffered physical pain. The rouge on 
her cheeks stood out like pink islands on the pallor of her 
skin. She stared at Westron for an awful moment, while 
there was silence at the table and Alan hurried round to her. 

“Darling, it’s all right, it’s all right,” he said soothingly. 
But she twisted away from him. 

“It isn’t all right,” she cried. “It’s all wrong. Every¬ 
thing’s wrong. Only I’d forgotten for the moment. I was 
happy because I’d managed to forget. And he goes and 


THE BURDEN 


134 

reminds me. He pities me. You all sit there pitying me. 
I hate you for your pity. I don’t want it, I tell you, I don’t 
want it.” 

She was sobbing, distraught. Again Alan tried to soothe 
her and again she pushed him away. 

“Leave me alone. I don’t want your pity any more than 
theirs. You don’t really care. You’ve got your work and 
all your other interests. I’m just a nuisance—a cross person 
at home. Oh! I know how you feel about it. I can tell 
easily enough.” Her voice died away into a moan of anguish 
as she dropped her head on to her hands. Her jade necklace 
rattled against her dessert plate as her bare shoulders 
heaved to her sobs. 

Alan drew her gently back, firmly in spite of her resist¬ 
ance. Then he wheeled her chair to the lift, and turning 
to say “I’ll be back in a minute,” took her upstairs. 

“Miss Minsleigh,” he said to the nurse, who came running 
to his call, “she’s been rather badly upset, poor child. Get 
her to bed. I’ll be with you presently.” He returned to 
his bewildered guests, who were already preparing to go. 

“She’s overdone it a little, preparing for this dinner,” he 
explained hurriedly. “I’m so sorry you’ve been distressed. 
Oh! it’s all right—don’t apologise.” This last was said coldly 
to the harassed Westron. 

“Wait behind a minute, will you, old man?” he begged 
of Vaizey. He suddenly felt he needed Vaizey. The others 
left. 

The servants had begun to clear the table, and the two 
men stood at the far end of the long room, by the fire¬ 
place.” 

“Oh, Lord!” said Alan. “Pretty awful to have that said 
of me—and in front of people.” 

“My dear man, you mustn’t take it seriously,” Vaizey 
answered. “She wasn’t herself, she was hysterical, didn’t 
even know what she was saying, let alone mean it.” 

“But it’s an indication, all the same.” 

“Of what?” 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


135 


Alan was attached to Vaizey; was prepared to confide in 
him, and to rely upon his judgment. At this particular 
moment he longed not only for sympathy, but for the un¬ 
biased opinion of some outside person capable of viewing 
the situation dispassionately. 

“Why, an indication that things aren’t going right,” 
he began, “and that they’ll get worse.” He was on the point 
of pouring out the whole of his troubles and his anxiety, 
but suddenly he checked himself. After all this was an inti¬ 
mate matter, concerning himself and Christine alone. It 
would be disloyal to her to discuss it. “No, that’s exagger¬ 
ating,” he said. “You’re right, Norman, old man. I mustn’t 
take it seriously. But I was just a bit upset for the moment, 
that was all.” 

“A change would do you good. Get right away for a bit, 
and come back fresh to it.” 

“To the conflict, you mean. God! yes, it is a conflict.” 

Vaizey smiled affectionately. “Life ought to be a conflict; 
it’s futile otherwise,” he said. 

“But this sort? Within oneself?” 

“That’s the hardest of all—and therefore the most worth 
while.” 

The door of the lift clicked and opened, and the nurse 
appeared. “Mrs. Carnes would like you to come up,” she 
said to Alan. 

“We’ll do a long walk together some day soon,” Alan 
suggested to Vaizey as he opened the door to him. 

“Delighted—any time you like. Good-night, old man, 
and don’t worry. ...” 

Christine was in bed, lying very still with a handkerchief 
steeped in eau-de-cologne over her forehead. 

“I’ve got such an awful headache,” she whispered. And 
then: “Alan darling, I was mad. Heaven knows what made 
me behave like that. Something seemed to snap in my 
brain. Can you ever forgive me?” 

He stooped and kissed her very tenderly. 


136 


THE BURDEN 


“My dear, my very dear, it’s nothing. Don’t think of 
it any more. Try to get to sleep.” 

He sat beside her, stroking her arm soothingly until at 
length, watching her, he saw that she had fallen peacefully 
asleep. 


CHAPTER FOURTEEN 


T WO days after the disastrous dinner party the general 
arrived at “the White Cottage” at twelve o’clock pre¬ 
cisely, and, since it was Friday, stayed to lunch. 

He asked questions about the dinner, but Christine was 
reticent. 

“Oh! it went off all right,” she said carelessly. “Not 
very exciting.” She led the conversation to other topics. 

But after lunch her father came back to the subject of 
the dinner. 

“You were so excited about it when I saw you last,” he 
said, “that I expected you’d be full of it to-day. What 
happened? Did somebody drop the soup tureen over a guest 
or something? Or had you forgotten how to play the host¬ 
ess? You’re so quiet about it,” he added, chaffingly, “that 
I believe it was an awful failure.” 

“It was.” 

In his abrupt way he demanded particulars. Had some¬ 
body not turned up at the last minute? Was the cooking 
bad? The cook had got drunk just before, perhaps—or 
was she, Christine, feeling seedy? 

“I suppose Alan didn’t let you down in any way, did he?” 
he asked, malevolently. And then hastily, “No, but of 
course he didn’t.” 

She had not meant to tell him. She still felt ashamed 
of herself when she recalled her passionate outburst that 
evening. Nevertheless, she did tell him. Eager to have his 
sympathy and his condonation, she told him everything that 
had occurred. 

She even repeated her words to Alan. 

“In fact,” she admitted, “I was completely unstrung, 
father, and I made a shocking exhibition of myself.” 

137 


138 


THE BURDEN 


His keen eyes examined her face. 

“Poor little woman!” he said. “Damn that blundering 
fool of a man for upsetting you like that.” 

“Poor Alan, you ought to say,” she answered. “It was 
awful for him. But he was splendid, though; not a word 
of reproach afterwards—just frightfully kind.” 

The general frowned. “Yes, but . . .” he began, and 
hesitated. “But you know, Chris, you weren’t really up to 
having this dinner, and he ought to have known that.” 

“He didn’t want me to from the first.” 

“Well, he ought to have been firm. It was the same with 
regard to taking you away in the summer. I said so all 
along. You may not have been keen to go, but it would 
certainly have done you good. He ought to have insisted. 
I’d have backed him up if he’d consulted me—but, of 
course, he didn’t. I can’t help feeling that he wasn’t par¬ 
ticularly anxious to go himself, and so didn’t bother much.” 

“No, no, father, that’s unjust.” 

“You say so. But I stick to it that he’s too absorbed in 
this work of his. He ought to put you before everything. 
That’s his first job. Everything else can go hang.” 

She protested, but not as hotly as she would have done in 
former days. Alan, she asserted, was devoted to her. 

“Queer thing, all the same,” her father commented, “that 
you should have come to say what you did the other evening. 
Shows what was in your mind, in my opinion. There isn’t 
smoke without fire, my dear.” 

“Nonsense, father! And please don’t insinuate such 
things. I was hysterical and disgracefully silly. That was 
all.” 

She changed the subject and declined to return to it. He 
left, as was his invariable habit, at three o’clock. 

“You’re looking very much below par. Take it easy,” 
were his parting words. 

She allowed herself to mope that afternoon. Her old 
power of mastering her moods of depression had left her. 
Latterly she had been giving way to them more and more. 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 139 

She sat with a book, which she did not read, and succumbed 
to the pressure of unhappy thoughts. 

Her father was right about her appearance. She was 
“below par.” But it was more than a merely temporary 
indisposition. She was losing her looks. Whenever she 
looked at herself in the glass she was conscious that her 
physical attractiveness was fading. The lustre had gone 
from her hair. Her colour had gone. Her skin was losing 
its soft freshness, her eyes their sparkle. Her whole face 
seemed altered, and with it her expression, which was 
strained and suggested everlasting fatigue. And her body 
was flabby. Fatigue—that was it. She was so easily tired 
nowadays. 

“Looks,” she would think to herself, “but what on earth 
do looks matter now?” Yet she knew that they still did 
matter intensely to her. She who had always taken such 
pride in her physical self dreaded the prospect of becoming 
plain, unattractive—ugly. 

She brooded. Her father—he should not have said what 
he did about Alan. He was jealous of Alan, had never 
really forgiven him for having won, was always ready to be 
vaguely disparaging about him. But her father had, after 
all, done little more than voice what had been, and were, her 
own thoughts on this matter. Alan was absorbed in his 
work. Too much absorbed in it? She was not sure. She 
w r anted him to be successful. How passionately she had 
longed for that in the old days, and how tremendous had 
been her faith in him! But he seemed to be less inclined 
now to come to her for encouragement and sympathy. He 
seemed almost to wish to exclude her from sharing in his in¬ 
terests. And he was grumpy sometimes—silent, self-ab¬ 
sorbed. Was he bored with her? Her affairs and interests 
were petty enough. This fashion plate work—it was some¬ 
thing, but—oh, trivial! And she had meant to do so much. 
Probably she was an extraordinarily difficult person to live 
with, but she was fighting against herself and her moods. 
He did not realise what an appalling struggle it was—all 
day and every day. How should he? He only came back 


140 


THE BURDEN 


to her in the evenings. He might be sympathetic, he gener¬ 
ally was so, but he could not know what her day had been, 
what every day was, and what every day would be. The 
future! She visualised the future and shuddered at her 
vision. Hell—it was a hell upon earth, this! And at one 
time she had stretched out her arms to life, ready to wel¬ 
come whatever should befall her. This had befallen her. 
She had wanted so much. She had felt herself capable of 
achieving so much. She had wanted, above all else she 
had wanted, to be a mother. But now. . . . The future, 
the inexorably empty future! But need it be so empty? 
More than once Alan had hinted to her that, though they 
could have no child of their own, it would be possible to 
adopt one. He had not pressed his suggestion, and she had 
let his hints go by. She had recoiled from the idea; she 
still recoiled from it. She felt that she could never rouse 
herself to be passionately interested in some one else’s 
child. Unfair to assume control of a child and not to de¬ 
vote one’s energies to its welfare—criminally unfair! A 
nice home, comforts, kindness—there would be all that to 
give. But so easily—too easily. There was more than that; 
there was that intensive absorption in character building and 
in education in its noblest sense. She had discussed all that 
with Alan several times—in the days when they had been 
looking forward and planning so hopefully. But she wanted 
to lavish her devotion on the fruit of her own body; she 
knew that she could never lavish such devotion on a strange 
and probably unwanted baby, product of some other per¬ 
son’s careless, unlasting passion. She shrank from the 
thought. Yet Alan . . . she was sure that Alan would wel¬ 
come her acceptance. 

It so chanced that no one came to see her that afternoon. 
She remained alone with her gloomy thoughts until Alan ar¬ 
rived home just before six. 

“You’re early,” she said, forcing a bright smile of wel¬ 
come. 

“Yes. Not much doing, so I slipped off to be with you. 
How’s my precious?” 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


141 


“Just a little tired, darling, that’s all.” 

She was unaware that that particular phrase exasperated 
him. It was not that he was angry with her for being 
tired, but he was despondent because of the cause. She 
was always “just a little tired” nowadays; and he had 
loved her robustness and her vigour. The phrase trans¬ 
muted itself in his mind into those terrible words “never 
again.” It was at once a reminder of the past and a pointer 
to the future. But on this particular evening it grated 
on him less than usual, for he had come home in good spirits, 
bearing good news. 

“I’ve something to tell you—something rather exciting,” 
he announced. “You know I’ve been moaning rather, and 
saying that the Chingford village hasn’t got me much fur¬ 
ther. Well, I was wrong, it seems. It has been noticed. 
We had a letter in the office to-day offering me a big town- 
planning job—on the strength of the design of Chingford. 
It’s a borough corporation affair, too, not a private firm.” 

“Alan! How splendid! ” She was very genuinely pleased. 
“I knew your work would get recognition in the end. Tell 
me all about it.” 

He gave her details. A long illustrated article on the 
Chingford village had appeared in a technical journal. It 
had attracted the attention of a progressive corporation in 
the north of England, one of whose members had come 
south specially to visit Chingford. His report had been 
enthusiastic, and he had persuaded his committee to com¬ 
mission the architect of Chingford to do the designs for a 
similar village which the corporation intended to build. 

“Of course,” said Alan, “they may not approve of the 
designs when they see them. But I’m pretty sure I can sat¬ 
isfy these ‘burghers of the north.’ ” 

He laughed gaily. “They may be hardheaded to deal 
with. But Dad will help me there. And besides, I’ve had 
the experience of Chingford, and I think I can appeal to 
their economical sense. I’d bet nobody could do the thing 
as well and yet as cheaply as we could.” 

“Splendid!” she said again. She was glad to see his en- 


142 


THE BURDEN 


thusiasm; glad, but, at the same time, just a little jealous 
of it. This sudden, unexpected fillip to his drooping hopes 
had made him positively exuberant. He seemed to have 
forgotten her. His work—always his work! 

“There’s one thing, though,” he said. “Assuming that I 
get the job, when I’ve done the designs I shall have to be up 
there on the spot superintending the actual work.” 

“Alan!” She stared at him, astonished. “You don’t 
mean to say that you-” 

“It will mean two or three months there straight on end 
at the start, I’m afraid. One must see for oneself that 
things go right. Afterwards—oh, I should think one visit 
a week would be enough . . . Why, what’s the matter, 
Chris? You look quite upset.” 

“Upset! Well, do you wonder at it? Do you seriously 
propose to go off to the north of England for months and 
leave me here alone? Alan, you couldn’t be so selfish. You 
wouldn’t do that—I couldn’t be without you. You mustn’t 
accept. It wouldn’t be fair to me. You’ve only got to wait 
a little longer and you’re sure to get another chance, some¬ 
where near London.” 

He was astonished. He had returned home so eager to 
tell her his news, so certain that she would be as delighted 
as he was. Her attitude disappointed him enormously. But 
he hid his annoyance. “It’s just one of her moods, poor 
child,” he thought. “She’ll be sensible in a minute or two.” 

“But you don’t understand,” he said patiently. “It’s a 
very big thing, this. It’s tremendously important. This 
sort of chance may not come again for ages. It will be a 
fine advertisement for me and, through me, for the firm. 
I could get up to town for week-ends. Or we could let the 
house and I could get you fixed up there—quite comfy. But 
it would be folly not to accept. You must see that.” 

But she declined to see it. She could only see that he 
was putting his work before her—just as her father had said 
he did. And how could she possibly exist, cut off from all 
her friends, in the middle of the Black Country “somewhere 
in Lancashire”? They argued the matter at length, each 



ALAN AND CHRISTINE 143 

thinking the other extraordinarily unreasonable. But she 
was less patient and more heated than was Alan. 

Foolishly he chose this inopportune moment, when there 
was no softness between them, to put it to her, as tactfully 
as he could, that they would be all the happier together 
afterwards if they were separated from each other for a lit¬ 
tle while. Did she not feel that things had been a little 
strained lately? Would it not be wise, on that account 
alone, if he went? He was hinting to her, delicately, that 
each needed a rest from the other. 

But she resented his hint, resented it bitterly, even though 
in her mind she knew well enough that he was certainly 
right. She said harsh things to him, biting things that 
were meant to hurt and did hurt. 

“You want an excuse to get away from me—that’s it 
really,” she cried. “You’ve been planning this for weeks, 
I daresay. And now, when you’ve got it more than half 
settled, you come and spring it on me like this and jaw 
about your beastly firm and your own prospects. You don’t 
give much consideration to my prospects, I notice. Why, 
you came into the house this evening looking as happy as if 
I were as fit and well as you are. You scarcely stopped to 
hear how I was and you haven’t yet asked me what I’ve 
done all day. Because something which affects you has 
happened. I used to think of you as unselfish and devoted. 
So you were—once. But you’re not now. You don’t care 
for me like you did. You put your career before everything. 
You’re prepared to slip off and leave your wife, your help¬ 
less wife, for months. But perhaps that’s the real reason— 
because she’s helpless. How am I to know that you don’t 
want—someone else, someone healthy and-” 

“Stop!” he shouted at her. “Christine, don’t you dare 
talk like that.” 

This, to him, was the unendurable insult. Had he not 
been fighting the stirring beast within himself for weeks? 
Had he not mastered it, crushed it down and back—wrest¬ 
ling with all his strength of will against forces of which she 



144 


THE BURDEN 


could know nothing? For her sake, for the sake of his 
love for her. And had he not conquered? 

He stood over her, and they glared at each other with 
bitterness in their eyes. 

“Take that last remark back/’ he ordered. Never since 
she had known him had she seen him look like that. She 
felt frightened—frightened and suddenly very humble. 

“Oh, Alan, I do. It was dreadful. I ... I beg your 
pardon.” 

She dropped her eyes from his and then suddenly burst 
into tears. 

“Don’t leave me, Alan darling, don’t leave me. I couldn’t 
bear it,” she moaned. “And I’m so miserable—so utterly 
miserable.” 

He was beside her at once, caressing her, soothing her, 
with only pity for her—pity and his abiding love for her— 
in his heart, where a moment before there had been furious, 
justifiable anger. 

“Darling one, don’t fret. You mustn’t fret, my own be¬ 
loved. Of course, I won’t leave you if you feel like that 
about it. I didn’t understand, my precious, but I do now. 
I’ll wait for something else. See? Chris, Chris darling, 
you’re everything to me. The silly work doesn’t count at 
all, really. Bless you, darling.” 

She wound her arms round his neck and held him close 
to her. 

“I’m such a beast to you, sometimes,” she whispered be¬ 
tween her sobs. “But I don’t mean to be. I love you— 
more and more, I love you, my only Alan.” 

He petted her as though she were a baby. 

“And now we’ll have a cosy little dinner together, shall 
we?” he said, reassuringly, “and be ridiculously senti¬ 
mental, you and I.” 

Christine, sobbing in Alan’s arms, allowing herself to 
be comforted and made at last to smile through her tears, 
had been penitent. She had been unjust to him and ex- 
asperatingly wayward. That much she had admitted, and 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 145 

she had expressed her regret. But her penitence did not 
reach the point of generously ceding the ground which she 
had gained. Alan made no further attempt to obtain her 
acquiescence; and she, without shame or remorse, counted 
on his given word. She did not love him less because she 
was now less willing to make sacrifices on his behalf. But, 
though she was unaware of it, she loved him differently. 
Her love was as intense, but it had narrowed, just as she, 
as a result of her restricted physical life, had narrowed men¬ 
tally. She had become intolerant. There were occasions in 
her relations with Alan when she felt aggressively antagon¬ 
istic towards him, occasions when she was totally blinded 
to anything but her own egotistical point of view. But 
she loved him; she loved him fiercely, possessively, in a dog- 
in-the-manger way. She was helpless. She could not walk, 
she could not share his outdoor amusements, she could never 
again gratify him physically, nor obtain from him the 
physical gratification that once had been for her, as for 
him, the coping stone, the climax, the crowning miracle of 
their mutual love. Nevertheless, he was hers. She clung 
desperately, pathetically, to memories. He had been hers, 
he should always be hers. He should have no other love 
but her—or the memory of her. She had no real fear of any 
woman as a rival. But his work was her rival. She had 
come to see that. She would not, could not tolerate that. 
His work must come second to her—always. Therefore, 
deep down in her soul, she was happy in having made him 
give way on this question of the new job. To her unbal¬ 
anced mind, warped in its judgment by the very circum¬ 
stances of her situation, she had won a triumphant victory. 
She had made him give way. She had made him subordi¬ 
nate his work to her. She had kept him for herself. Secretly, 
she was not penitent, but proud. 

But the soft mood of self-reproach had not remained with 
Alan. There had been that devastating moment when she 
had humbled herself before him because of the accusation 
which she had made, the moment when she had crept 
ashamed and weeping into his forgiving arms. And at that 


146 


THE BURDEN 


moment he had felt himself to be a heartless, selfish beast. 
But later, when the emotion of that moment had ebbed 
and he was able to pass a critical judgment on the matter, 
he realised that it was not he, but she who was being 
selfish. For what good could he do by refusing this job? 
Obviously none. Obviously he had been right in his hint; 
both of them would benefit enormously by a temporary 
separation. But in rejecting the job he was rejecting a 
quite exceptional chance, which might never occur again. 
It might mean the jeopardising of his whole career—his ca¬ 
reer, at least, as he had allowed his ambitions to plan it 
for him. To no purpose; to no earthly purpose. Thinking 
it over afterwards, he experienced savage resentment; he 
tried to make himself believe that his resentment was not 
against her personally (“Poor child, she can’t help herself,” 
he argued), but against the fate which had reduced him to 
this damnable situation. He realised, with something of an 
additional shock, that his burden had been heavily increased. 
Was not his life difficult enough in all conscience? But now 
—if his work was to be threatened, if he was to be thwarted 
thus in all his opportunities! God, merciful God! Then this 
was a greater hell than he had dreamt of. 

He had to face his father and make his excuses. Mr. 
Carnes was naturally inquisitive. Not accept the job! But 
he was a triple fool. “Bless me, boy, but it’s the chance of 
a lifetime! Why ever not?” 

Alan was purposely vague. He was tempted to whine to 
his father and come out with all his difficulties. Probably 
his father, the most understanding of men, would sympa¬ 
thise. But with an effort he was loyal to Christine. 

“Oh, I couldn’t leave her all that time, you see!” he said. 
“She’s willing enough, I need hardly say; she’s so keen on 
my work. But it wouldn’t be right, Dad. Not as she is at 
present I’ll hang on till something turns up nearer home.” 

“But is there anything wrong with the dear girl, anything 
further, I mean? Are you anxious in any way?” It was 
obvious that the old man was anxious himself. Possibly he 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 147 

was suspicious, too, that Alan was hiding something from 
him. 

“No, no—just the general situation, you know, Dad.” 

Mr. Carnes laid a hand on his son’s shoulder. The very 
contact of that hand was a message to Alan. His father 
knew and understood, but was too splendidly tactful to probe 
further. 

“Old boy—things aren’t easy for you,” said Mr. Carnes. 

He shifted to an entirely different subject. 

“Alan, I’ve been meaning to ask you for a long time,” 
he said, “but I hated talking of it. About Laura. Things 
aren’t right, as you must have noticed. I’m worried about 
her. She and Ronny don’t seem to hit it off now. Not that 
either of them has said anything to me. But I’m not a fool 
or blind. And things have come back to me. They say 
she’s gadding about too much. And I’m sure Ronny is sus¬ 
picious. He’s not a bad chap, you know, if one takes him 
right. Quick-tempered, though; difficult sometimes. But 
she’s unhappy, Alan, I’m as certain of it as I am that this 
dam’ Government’s playing hell with the country—Europe 
for that matter. This Errington fellow. She’s always with 
him. Is there anything in it? Does she care for him—seri¬ 
ously? But she couldn’t—he’s a bit of a bad hat, they say. 
I hate to think of her unhappy, though. She was always 
such a jolly person, Laura.” 

Suddenly he clutched Alan’s sleeve. 

“Look here, old man. We’ve got to see about things. 
There mustn’t be a crash. By God, there mustn’t be a 
crash! It would finish your mother, that would.” 

“Easy on, Dad! You’re getting jumpy.” 

Alan looked into his father’s eyes, as blue and steady as 
his own. He loved the old man, with his directness, his un¬ 
swerving loyalty, his absurdly simple belief that everything 
ought to be right in the best of all possible worlds. 

“I’ll keep my eyes open—not that I think there’s any¬ 
thing to be really anxious about. But perhaps it would be as 
well to drop Ronny a hint, wouldn’t it? He’s a clumsy fool 


148 


THE BURDEN 


in some ways, and Max Errington—well, he’s careful by all 
accounts, but he’s dangerous too.” 

They left it at that and Alan was gratified to think that 
his father had appealed to him for sympathy and for help. 

But it was an additional worry laid on Alan’s shoulders. 
Laura, Laura—Heavens!—had he not enough troubles of 
his own without dabbling in her affairs? But she was his 
sister; he would hate to see her go wrong. Ronny was a 
bit of a swine. He, Alan, had never taken to him. And he 
was drinking a bit now, every one knew that. Still, this 
Errington fellow—a useless waster, that much was obvious. 
Even old Helyar had been right about that. But, good 
God! he had other things to think about. He had made 
the situation easier at home by throwing up a good job, 
but things were not right all the same. Nothing was right 
—he knew that. Everything was so humdrum and trivial. 
. . . commonplace. Why couldn’t something big happen to 
set Christine and himself on the old terms with each other? 
Surely that was possible. He loved her now as much as 
ever he did. But this damned infirmity of hers—it did come 
in the way. All the time it was in the way. He wanted— 
God, how he wanted!—solace, relief, physical love, but she 
could not give him that. 


CHAPTER FIFTEEN 



TAN dropped his hint to Ronny Dumayne at the an- 


X nual dinner of the division in which they had served 
together for a time during the war. It was Vaizey who had 
pursuaded Alan to attend the dinner. 

“Better come, old man. It’s interesting to see the varied 
effects which the peace has had on people. Some of ’em 
are prosperous now, and bombastic—and some of ’em aren’t, 
and they’re apt to be bitter. I went last year. It’s good 
value as a study.” 

“Joviality, heartiness, clap-trap speeches about the en¬ 
nobling effect of comradeship in arms—I know the sort of 
thing,” grumbled Alan. 

“Do you good all the same,” Vaizey persisted. 

Alan knew that Vaizey was right. It would be good to 
spend an evening among men. It would be “a night off.” 
He pulled himself up abruptly before the unspoken phrase, 
“a night off”—so he had come thus to regard an evening 
spent away from home! He felt rather ashamed of that in¬ 
voluntary thought of his. But he went to the dinner. 

In the end he enjoyed himself. He saw precisely what 
Norman Vaizey had meant by the expression: “It’s good 
value as a study.” Alan was interested. Quite easily he 
found himself pleased to be amongst a throng of men, all 
saying: “Hullo! What are you doing these days?” or “Do 
you remember when we were at . . .?” all friendly and 
eager to exchange reminiscences with any one who would 
listen. 

It was a good dinner, enlivened by much drink and 
laughter. Ronny Dumayne, with his miniature medals ag- 
gravatingly conspicuous, so Alan thought, though, in reality, 
they were no more so than those of any other man present, 


149 


150 


THE BURDEN 


was in good form—which meant that, as the central figure 
in a noisy group, he emptied his glass quickly and frequently 
and had hearty, if somewhat coarse, greetings for every one. 
His speech, proposing “Absent Friends,” was happy in its 
avoidance of all allusion to the morbid side: allusion, that 
is, to those who were absent because they were dead. He 
confined himself to rather obvious chaff of those who were 
still alive. He told one or two stories which had point but 
lacked refinement, and was successful in raising roars of 
laughter. He sat down looking very well pleased with his 
contribution to the gaiety of the evening. It was evident 
that he was not perfectly sober. 

“Dumayne always was a sport,” Alan heard a man say 
to his neighbour. “D’you remember that rest billet we 
were in behind Arras—and those girls . . .?” 

“Oh! a sport, yes,” thought Alan grimly. “Suppose I’d 
better have a word with him about Laura to-night. He’s 
less likely to take it amiss in his present happy frame of 
mind.” 

He walked with Ronny as far as the latter’s club. On 
the way he said: “Look here, old man, don’t think me im¬ 
pertinent, but are you keeping an eye on this Errington fel¬ 
low?” 

“How d’you mean?” Ronny’s voice was thick. 

“Well, with Laura, I mean. She’s about with him a hell 
of a lot, and he’s got something of a name, you know. Peo¬ 
ple are talking.” 

“Let ’em,” retorted Ronny, casually. “Laura’s all right 
—in her way. It isn’t exactly my way, true enough. But 
we don’t bother each other. We just drift along. Only 
thing to do in marriage.” 

“It’s—dangerous.” 

“Dangerous! Lord, no! She wants her bit o’ fun, same 
as I want mine, that’s all. She won’t overstep herself.” 

“I shouldn’t just leave it at that, all the same. It’s 
. . . it’s rather up to you to hold her, isn’t it?” 

They had reached the club and were standing on its steps. 
Ronny put his flushed face close to Alan’s. 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


151 

“What ’xactly do you mean?” he demanded. “Are you 
hiding something? Because if I thought . . . damn the 
fellow ...” 

“No, I don’t know anything. But I know Laura pretty 
well. And she’s . . . well, she isn’t perfectly contented 
with her life. She’s apt to be reckless sometimes, you 
know.” 

“Oh! curse all women—that’s what I feel. Never are 
contented. Come in an’ have a drink.” 

But Alan declined. “You go to bed,” he suggested, “and 
think things over. Don’t look upon me as an interfering nui¬ 
sance. I’m not. Good-night, Ron.” 

Alan drove home thinking: “Damned fool, he is. Doesn’t 
see and, when it’s pointed out to him, doesn’t seem to care 
much. Pity! He’s letting Laura spoil herself. Lord! and 
the chance that they’ve had—have still got—those two, to 
make something of their lives. And I? Oh, hell! Yet . . . 
damn it, I’d rather be as I am, with Christine as she is, than 
be Ronny. Poor little Chris! Mine’s a harder job than 
his, by a very long way. And I swear I’m making a damn 
sight better show of it. What did he say? ‘J ust drifting 
along—only thing to do in marriage’ . . . But it isn’t 
. . . he’s hopelessly wrong. We know that, Chris and I. 
We can do better than that—even now. By God! we can. 
And we’ll prove it too.” 

It had been a good dinner, enlivened by much drink, 
and Alan had not stinted himself. His mind was suffused 
with the pleasing glow of his noble resolve, even as his 
body still felt the glow of good wine. Tenderness for Chris¬ 
tine, love for her welled up in him. To make her as happy 
as was possible, to devote himself to her—that was his first 
job; and he was doing it, doing it well. He was proud of 
himself . . . 

It was nearly midnight when he got in, but she was awake 
and reading. He sat on her bed and described his evening to 
her. He talked briskly, cheerfully, amusingly. She re¬ 
sponded to his mood, laughing with him, chaffing him in 


THE BURDEN 


152 

their old intimate way. Their minds were more nearly at¬ 
tuned than they had been for weeks. 

“And Ronny? How did he behave?” she asked. 

“Very much the ‘cheery sport , 5 you know.” He told her 
nothing of his conversation with Ronny: wiser not to men¬ 
tion it, he thought. 

He caressed her affectionately. She looked pretty, lying 
there smiling up at him: attractive, damnably alluring. He 
went on caressing her, fondly—more than fondly—with 
more passion than he had ever dared to let himself show 
since she had become unapproachable. She was strangely 
responsive. 

“Darling, my darling , 55 she whispered, with her arms 
pressed round him and her lips against his. “I understand. 
Don’t think I don’t understand how hard it is for you.” 

Desire, fierce and dangerous desire, surged up in him. 
He needed her: needed her desperately—and she was un¬ 
attainable, she would always be unattainable. He fought 
with his desire, mastered it with a tremendous effort of will. 
Gently he disengaged her arms from his neck. 

“You must go to sleep now, my precious,” he said; and 
was surprised at the steadiness of his own voice. 

But sleep was withheld from Alan for a long time that 
night. For him, as he well knew, the stirring up of passion 
was dangerous. Yet he had allowed it to be stirred. He had 
returned home in a mood of strange exaltation, renewing his 
vows towards Christine and welcoming the high and noble 
resolves which had taken momentary possession of his mind. 
But now his noble resolves melted like snow before the 
warmth of his desire. Lying awake, while his invalid wife 
slept beside him, he could turn his thoughts to no other di¬ 
rection but one—to his need of her. And being unable to 
think of anything but that, he perceived, as never before, 
the magnitude of the task before him. Time was, when 
he had gloried in that task. But now, instead of glorying 
in it, he was appalled by it. All his life, he foresaw, there 
would be this desperate conflict to wage—with himself, with 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


153 

the baser side of himself. He foresaw—and he was piteously 
afraid. He knew that from that night onwards his tempta¬ 
tions would be greater and his powers of resistance less. 

Temptation came to him and seemed never to leave him. 
He fought it fiercely, telling himself the while that he was 
fighting in defence of his love for Christine—that love of 
which he was so proud, because it was a love of the mind and 
the spirit, as well as of the flesh. These subtle suggestions 
that crowded in upon him, seizing his attention, capturing 
his thoughts, alluring him, torturing him—these were of the 
flesh, that and no more. But they were powerful, persistent, 
specious. 

“Retain your spiritual and mental love,” it was whispered 
to him insidiously. “You must be faithful in that. But 
yield in the other way. It is no more than natural, this. 
Suppress nature and you will only make your situation a 
hundred times more difficult. You will become irritable and 
intolerant and unsympathetic—the very strain of resistance 
will make you so. You will be unable to be the help to her 
that you ought to be. But yield—yield in what, so far as she 
is concerned now, does not really count at all—and you will 
both be happier. It is for her sake, in a way, as much as 
for your own. You’re a man; you cannot expect to possess 
superhuman restraint. No normal man—and you are only 
normal—could do what you are trying and hoping to do.” 

For three exhausting weeks he pitted his strength of mind 
against the remorseless strength of his temptations. His 
temptations grew in power from day to day. He had no 
peace of mind or of soul. He tried to keep himself on guard, 
alert and watchful against a surprise attack. He wore him¬ 
self out in the process; he became peevish, pre-occupied, 
nervy. He showed his resentment of Christine’s varying 
moods as he had never before allowed himself to show it. 
More than once she demanded, reproachfully: “What’s the 
matter with you? You’re so cross nowadays—so unkind.” 
And he had no answer that he could give her. He knew 
the answer. But he could not tell her. 

There was no peace, no rest for him. Little things, which 


154 


THE BURDEN 


previously would not have affected him at all, were magni¬ 
fied now and became of vast and dangerous importance. 
Dining out one night he sat at table beside an attractive 
woman who was palpably ready to encourage boldness and 
to follow whither he might lead. He laughed with her—no 
more than that—through a pleasant meal, but the accidental 
touch of her knee against his under the table set his 
pulses throbbing and whirled his thoughts round to the dan¬ 
gerous direction. On another occasion it chanced that he 
was taken to a revue. Its daring—not very great in reality 
—tortured him with its semi-veiled suggestiveness. He sat 
and fretted all through it, trying desperately to think of 
other things—to think of anything but the one thing which 
recurred and kept on recurring to his mind. A clever, but 
definitely indecent story overheard at his club, instead of 
disgusting him, excited him. A semi-erotic novel, picked up 
casually—the sort of book which normally he would have 
dropped again in contempt—held his attention for a couple 
of wasted hours; its more lurid passages enthralled him. 
He despised himself, even as he sat and read them. Never¬ 
theless, he abandoned himself to their provocative attrac¬ 
tion. 

It was the accumulation of many little things which wore 
him down in the end; that, and the persistent whisper in 
his mind: “There is no wrong in it, situated as you are. 
It is physical, nothing more. You must have relief.” He 
had made a gallant fight against himself. But here came 
a day when he was forced to own himself beaten. He faced 
the fact squarely, sitting alone before a pile of neglected 
work in his office. “I can’t stand it any more,” he told him¬ 
self. “I’m being driven crazy. I must—yes, I must.” 

Then with his resolution made, he thrust his conscience 
and his thoughts of Christine from his mind. 

“It’s my affair, this—no one else’s. I will not allow my¬ 
self to feel remorse. It’s lust—just that. . . . But it’s 
beaten me.” 

Secretly and with deliberate, calculated care, he made 
his arrangements. 


CHAPTER SIXTEEN 


AN had dined at home, along with Christine. The 



JLX fire flickered at the far end of the room, and four 
shaded candles threw their soft light on to the table. 
Beyond the table were shadows. He had just lighted his 
cigarette and was leaning back in his tilted chair with one 
hand in his side pocket and one playing with the lace 
doily under his dessert bowl. He had been answering her 
talk throughout dinner, but he had not initiated any of their 
conversation. Christine put out her hand and touched his, 
then held it firmly. 

“What is it, my dear?” she asked fondly. “You’re so 
silent. Is it your work? And I’ve been babbling away 
about my silly drawings all this time.” 

“But I’ve been ever so interested, Chris. I’m so glad 
you’ve had some taken and got an offer for more. It will 
mean a regular job in the end, I’m certain.” 

But he was rousing himself to enthusiasm only by an ef¬ 
fort. Christine could see that. 

“Tell me. Your worries ought to be mine too,” she per¬ 
sisted. 

To tell her! It was his moment to tell her, and he knew 
it. He had meant never to tell her. When he had admitted 
that he could resist temptation no longer, he had decided 
that his lapse should be his own secret; he would bury the 
incidents of one mad afternoon deep, inaccessibly deep, in 
his consciousness, and so in time come to forget them, or at 
least to ignore them. But he could neither ignore nor forget 
them. The remorse which he had vowed should not trouble 
him at all was oppressing him. He could not escape from 


155 


THE BURDEN 


156 

an overwhelming sense of guilt—he, the traitor, who had 
betrayed his trust. All through an unhappy week, from the 
moment when, with shame in his heart, he had entered his 
own house after his visit to another house until this present 
moment, when Christine, with her quick and watchful eyes 
upon him, was pleading with him to let her share his 
trouble—all through that miserable week he had known 
that he could have no peace of soul until he had told her 
everything. Yet he had dreaded telling her. To hit her 
in the face with his fist would be no more vile an act than to 
take their expressed ideal of what their love for each other 
meant to both of them and to smash it to bits before her 
eyes. Nevertheless he knew that she must be told—every¬ 
thing. Craving to tell her, yet dreading telling her, he had 
been wary. At least he would give his miserable defence 
of himself every chance; at least he would wait for an aus¬ 
picious moment, some occasion when she was in a soft, com¬ 
placent mood. And now—this was his moment. She was 
more than complacent; she was tender, sympathetic, solici¬ 
tous. She had put her own troubles unselfishly aside be¬ 
cause she had guessed that all was not well with him. She 
had demanded his confidences. She should have his con¬ 
fession. 

He sat brooding in silence for so long that she withdrew 
her hand from his at last. 

“Very well. It’s as you wish, Alan,” she said quietly and 
rather sadly. “But I know there’s something.” 

“There is.” He looked at her. Her brown evening 
frock was an old one now, but it had been new for their 
honeymoon, and so carried memories and sentiment in every 
line of it. “I love it,” he had told her when he had first 
seen it. “It’s such a quiet shade, and so one gets a chance 
to see that there is sunlight hidden in the brown of your 
hair.” There was less lustre in her hair now, but it was still 
beautiful—very beautiful to him as he sat there looking 
at it crowning her pale face. Her eyes, for all the dark 
lines under them, were not dulled. Their softness, that had 
thrilled him so often, was there to stir him now. But he 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 157 

could not look at her steadily at just this moment. He looked 
down into the remains of his coffee. 

“There is,” he repeated slowly. 

“Poor old boy! Let me help.” Knowing him, knowing 
that, when he felt deeply about anything, he was often slow 
to frame his thoughts, seeking for the exact expression of 
them, she waited in silence after those two simple phrases of 
encouragement. 

“Do you remember, Chris, we were once discussing the 
various aspects of love—a long time ago it was, on our 
honeymoon? And we made suppositions. Supposing we 
had nothing in common mentally—that sort of thing.” 

“I remember. And we differed rather. I remember that 
too. You were awfully convincing as you argued, but I just 
felt I was right.” 

“You were.” 

“But in what? I can’t remember the details now.” 

“You said that men were different. Well, they are.” 

“But, Alan, what are you aiming at? I can’t follow.” 

“You said then that with a man the physical side is more 
of an incidental—to be satisfied somehow. You remember?” 

“Yes . . . Alan, what do you mean?” Then suddenly, 
as realisation came to her: “Look at me! Oh, is it that, is it 
that?” 

He looked at her and she saw that the colour had ebbed 
from his face. His left hand, the nearer to her, was tightly 
clenched. 

“It was the hell of a fight—give me the credit for that at 
least. . . . But I was beaten. And . . . oh, there isn’t any 
excuse, I know that! ” 

“You . . . beast!” 

“That ... is the word.” 

He wanted to look away from her, but she seemed to 
have the power to hold his eyes to hers. She seemed to 
him to be looking through his eyes straight into his mind 
—and hating his mind. Her features were set hard with icy 
hatred. There was silence. 


THE BURDEN 


158 

“If only she would let herself go / 5 he was thinking. “If 
only she would flare up . 55 

“Chris / 5 he muttered at last. “You don’t understand, 
Chris . 55 

Then she spoke, slowly, precisely, and with devastating 
directness. 

“Yes / 5 she said, “I do understand. A man has to have— 
that. You are a man and you needed—that. You have a 
wife who is a helpless cripple, no use to you. So you 
turned elsewhere. It’s simple, and I might have known . 55 

He longed to appeal to her, to beg her to be merciful. But 
the awful hardness in her tone forbade any appeal what¬ 
ever. 

“I 5 ve been a fool / 5 she went on. “I’ve believed in you 
and trusted you. I thought—such a silly thing to think!— 
that you were different. I believed that once you’d love me 
you would never want to love any one else- 55 

“I’ve not loved any one else / 5 he broke in. 

“Slaked your lust, then—it means the same for you, I 
see that now. But I thought that you had given yourself 
to me, utterly and for ever, as I gave myself to you. I said 
I trusted you; but it wasn’t a question of trust. It was just 
that I imagined you loved me, like I loved you, and that, 
therefore, there could never be any possibility of—an¬ 
other . 55 

“There is no other. Believe me, I beg you to believe me 
in that. There is no other—who counts . 55 

“There has been another to whom you gave yourself—ob¬ 
viously . 55 The contempt in her voice stung him like hail. 

“I did not give myself. I . . . just took . 55 

“Are you capable of anything higher than that? I doubt 
it—now. Perhaps you never were. But you talked a lot 
at one time about ideals. For us, for you and me, passion 
was to be—what was your phrase?—the coping-stone of 
the structure of our love, that was it. Our love! We made 
something beautiful and you’ve defiled it. At the first temp¬ 
tation you succumb—to a mere appetite . 55 

“The first temptation—the first, good God! Oh, Chris, 



ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


159 


if you could only know-” But he checked himself. Of 

what use could excuses be? He was ashamed to give ex¬ 
cuses. 

“Well?” She waited, with no sign of softening in her 
face. 

“There is nothing for me to say.” He stood up and went 
to the fireplace. He leant his elbow on the mantelpiece and 
watched the leaping flames. “Nothing—except that I loathe 
myself for this.” 

“Nothing? Won’t you tell me of this new love of yours? 
Is she pretty, attractive, clever? She’s not a stay-at-home, 
I’m sure. Probably she . . .” 

He turned sharply to face Christine, still sitting at the din¬ 
ner table. 

“Ah, don’t, for God’s sake, don’t!” he cried. “I’m not 
asking you to forgive. But have a little pity. Don’t think 
worse than the truth. You needn’t—to condemn me.” 

“The truth! What is the truth? Don’t I know it?” 

“No—not if you assume that there is some other woman 
I care for. There isn’t—I swear there isn’t.” 

“Tell me—everything. I’ve a right to know.” 

“There is only this to say. I wasn’t strong enough to hold 
out. I did for a long time, but I was beaten in the end. 
I gave in. I spent three hours with a woman whom I had 
never seen before and will never see again. I’ve not known 
a moment’s peace since. And . . . you were right just now, 
Chris. I’ve defiled something beautiful. But . . . you 
can’t understand this . . but I love you still, you and only 
you. I never stopped loving you. And yet . . . I . . . 
did that.” 

He dropped heavily into an armchair before the fire and 
sat with his head in his hands. “What next? My God! 
What next?” he thought. 

He looked up to find Christine wheeling herself towards 
him. She stopped her chair on her own side of the fire¬ 
place. 

“Why did you tell me?” she asked. “You needn’t have. 
I should never have known.” 



160 


THE BURDEN 


“I didn’t intend to. I meant to keep it secret for ever. 
But ... I couldn’t, Chris.” He stretched a hand towards 
her, but withdrew it again. He dreaded lest she should repel 
him. She sat very still. “I just couldn’t. Even if telling 
you meant the end of everything—you’d got to know. I 
could not have gone on with this on my mind. I’ve told 
you, I’m glad I’ve told you. But oh! Chris, I feel such a 
brute, such an awful, earthy brute, for what I did. I’ve 
hurt you; I’ve destroyed your trust in me. And I valued 
that more than anything in the world. But . . . will you 
. . . could you ever? . . . Chris . . . Chris ... I beg 
you to forgive.” 

She looked at him. She saw the appeal in his eyes and 
the utter dejection of his attitude. She knew that he had 
suffered terribly and was suffering still. Pity welled up in 
her. How could she withhold her forgiveness? He was 
miserable, he was penitent and humble, and he was, after all, 
her Alan, whom she would love whatever he did—even this. 
But she had passed through a moment when she had hated 
him for what he had done. She strangled her hatred at its 
birth. 

“I will understand,” she told herself. “If I can under¬ 
stand I can forgive.” She wanted to forgive. 

“Tell me, Alan,” she said. “You didn’t love this . . . 
other. Swear you didn’t. Swear it was nothing more than 
just . . . that.” 

He raised a troubled, haggard face to hers—and saw that 
her eyes were wet. 

“I swear,” he said. And then: “O my dear, my dear, can 
you forgive?” 

“Yes,” she answered quietly. “Because I love you and 
because I understand.” 

He knelt beside her chair and taking both her hands in 
his, looked at her for a long time before he spoke. 

“Because you understand,” he said at last. “That’s it. 
There is no one in the world like you. You always under¬ 
stand.” 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 161 

She put her arms round his neck and drew his head down 
to her breast. 

“My poor Alan! It’s desperately hard for you. I haven’t 
realised how hard, till now.” 

She paused for a moment. 

“Alan dear, we must face the facts. It isn’t going to get 
easier as time goes on—for either of us. You see-” 

“Yes, it is,” he broke in. “It will be easier from now on. 
We’ve been drifting apart lately. But we are together again 
now. We’ve got back to where we were. It’s rather awful 
to think that this . . . that what I’ve done . . . should be 
the cause of bringing us back to each other. But it is so. 
Your wonderful understanding and forgiveness, Chris! 
You’ve made me feel most desperately ashamed. But you’ve 
given me a new strength and courage, now, all the same.” 

“I’ve been difficult sometimes, I’m afraid.” 

“Not you; it wasn’t really you, it was just the circum¬ 
stances. But I admit that I had become frightened. I 
knew things were not right between us and I couldn’t see 
how to put them right. There was a barrier growing up be¬ 
tween us. We had ceased to be comrades. I felt it and 1 
know you felt it, too. It was so, wasn’t it?” 

“Yes. And it made me miserable. And then I became 
fractious and unsympathetic, and nervy.” 

“But we’ve broken down the barrier now. We’re as we 
used to be. We understand each other again. We’re going 
to help each other; share life with each other.” 

“Yes,” she said eagerly. “Yes, Alan—to help each other, 
that’s all that matters. To be close to each other in mind 
and spirit; we’ve been so far away lately. And oh, my 
dear! I’ve needed you so much, so desperately much.” 

“And I you . . .” 

They sat up late, with no light in the room except the 
fire, and talked as though they were meeting for the first 
time after months of separation. The old intimacy of 
thought, so long absent, returned to them. They spoke their 
minds frankly, facing their difficulties bravely, comforting 
each other, encouraging each other. Christine made him 



162 


THE BURDEN 


talk of himself and of the fight with himself which he had 
had. 

“No,” she said, when at first he showed reluctance. “No, 
it’s much better that I should understand everything. I’m 
not going to blame you any more, remember. But I want to 
see it all from your point of view.” 

He told her, then. Simply and straightforwardly he de¬ 
scribed to her how sex had begun to whisper to him and how 
easy it had been, at first, to ignore those whispers, to scorn 
them into silence; how the voice, the urge within him, had 
grown louder and more persistent; how he had begun to be 
afraid of himself; how he had fought and struggled; how the 
very fact that he was out of sympathy with her had made 
things infinitely harder for him; how his powers of re¬ 
sistance had been worn down, day by day, until at last he 
was almost crazy because he could never for long divert his 
mind to other things; and how at last, weakened and 
ashamed, he had given way. 

“But afterwards—oh, Chris! how I hated myself after¬ 
wards. I thought myself so strong—and I was miserably 
weak. I believed in my ideals and I couldn’t hold to them. 
I loved you, as much—more—than ever I did. And yet I 
wasn’t able to keep faith with you. . . 

He talked on, reproaching himself, revealing himself, con¬ 
fessing himself. And Christine, stroking his hand quietly, 
let him talk without interruption. She saw into his mind, 
then, as she had never before seen into it. His share of 
their common burden, she now perceived, was far heavier 
than she had realised. He had carried it manfully for more 
than a year. But he was not superhuman. He had stag¬ 
gered under it and at last had fallen. Had she any right 
to blame him? For he would lift it up again and go bravely 
forward. He might fall again; he would fall again—in her 
heart she knew that though in her mind she tried to resist 
the thought. But she saw him now in a new light. He 
needed her protection and her comfort every whit as much 
as she needed his. He had wounded her pride, but she would 
be big enough to rise above the pettiness of that. She 


ALAN AND CHRISTINE 


163 

would show him that she could be splendidly generous. He 
had been miserable and desolate, and he had come back to 
her for solace. They were nearer to each other now than 
they had been for months. He was hers again—in spite of, 
perhaps because of, all that had happened. He could not do 
without her. He could not deceive her and remain happy. 
He had suffered—poor boy, how he had suffered! Because 
he cared for her, because he loved her still. 

She listened to his protestations that henceforth he would 
find it easy to resist temptation. She knew that in making 
fresh vows he was in earnest and was sincere in his belief 
that he could keep them. She allowed herself to be carried 
away by his earnestness and his sincerity. He had not 
given his love elsewhere and he had come back to her. She 
would steel herself to forget the rest and to be content with 
that. He had been faithful to her in mind and spirit. She 
would keep his mind and his spirit faithful to her. She would 
devote her whole energies to that one end. And she could 
do it now—now that the barrier was broken and they were 
together again—comrades as they had been at the begin¬ 
ning. She must never let that barrier be built up again. 
She must fight her nerves and her ailments and her depres¬ 
sion, and be to him what she had meant to be—always a 
helpmate, and never a hindrance. Tenderness for him flooded 
her whole being. Hope, so long drooping in her heart, re¬ 
vived again. The future was no longer a dark and threaten¬ 
ing gorge, along which she would have to grope her way 
alone. It was a path towards a goal, alluring because it was 
difficult, worth following because there was a joy in the 
effort. Nor would she be alone. He had rejoined her, this 
fellow traveller of hers. They would tread the path together 
—rough places and smooth, uphill and down, in warmth 
or in cold—but together. . . . 

“We’re going to begin again,” Alan said softly, hopefully. 

She held out her arms to him. 

“Alan, oh, Alan dearest!” 








PART THREE 


Alan 

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN 

F OR a month Alan lived happily in his world of illusion. 

His position was so obviously eased that it was inevit¬ 
able that he should deceive himself into believing that all 
was well and would remain well permanently. His desires, 
assuaged, receded into the unimportant background. In 
the foreground, comfortingly plain, were solid facts. Chris¬ 
tine was keeping her nerves under control; her health seemed 
to have improved; her prevailing mood was one of optimis¬ 
tic cheerfulness. Alan was happy to return to her in the 
evenings and tell her of all his doings. She was busy with 
her drawing, but she was always ready to push it aside and 
listen eagerly to his account of his day. Her interest in his 
work and in his plans seemed to have revived; it was genu¬ 
ine and enthusiastic again, instead of perfunctory and 
vague; he felt that her forgiveness of him was complete. He 
thought of her as a martyr to circumstance, a saint in 
patience and forbearance, an angel in disposition. They were 
back upon the higher plane of self-sacrificing idealism. They 
were “beginning again,” as he had said they could, with re¬ 
newed hope and renewed confidence. Low-hanging clouds of 
misunderstanding and antipathy had been rolled back. They 
were the comrades that they once had been. . . . 

The descent from the higher plane was gradual, so gradual 
as to be almost imperceptible at first. There was no quar¬ 
rel, there was not even a cross word spoken between them. 
But as the weeks passed Alan knew, and he was subtly aware 

165 


166 


THE BURDEN 


that Christine knew too, that their newly-recovered relation¬ 
ship was not destined to endure. They were reverting to 
their former state of strain. Each was making an effort to 
be easy and natural with the other, each was conscious that 
the exertion necessary to keep mutual exasperation under 
control and out of sight was an irksome burden, and not in 
any sense a joy—the joy of doing something for the other. 
Antagonism existed. They had buried it deep, but it 
smouldered. Each watched the other jealously, fearful of 
an explosion. 

The third month passed, then the fourth, and spring had 
come again. Alan took to going for long walks on Saturday 
afternoons, usually by himself, but sometimes with Norman 
Vaizey. He said nothing to the latter of his misgivings, 
for he was not yet prepared to receive advice, still less to 
accept sympathy. His loyalty to Christine remained with 
him still. But the walks did him good; cleared his brain and 
tired his body; lifted him temporarily out of his groove and 
forced him, through contact with an essentially vigorous 
mind, to realise—at least for a few hours—that there were 
other problems besides his own in a highly complex world. 

Returning from one of these walks late one warm May 
evening, he let himself in at the garden gate and walked 
up the path towards the house. His shoes were studded with 
rubber and his footsteps gave no sound of his approach. 
The front door was open and the window curtains had not 
been drawn. Through one of the windows he saw into the 
big living-room; he saw a woman in a man’s arms. They 
were kissing each other with a passion that was very obvious. 
He walked straight on, dropped his stick into the stand with 
a deliberate clatter, came round the corner of the door, and 
was face to face with his sister and Max Errington. They 
were in evening dress, and Max, with perfect sang-froid, 
was helping her into her cloak. 

“Hullo, old thing!” Laura greeted him. “Had a good 
outing? We’re just off. Been keeping Chris company. 
She’s just gone up.” 

Already he had made up his mind. For the first second 


ALAN 


167 

or two he had wanted to confront them with what he had 
seen. “Damn you both! I won’t have your sordid intrigue 
going on in my house!” he had wanted to shout. But . . . 
he knew Laura. Better to deal with her separately and 
quietly later. And—what right had he to interfere? A 
brother’s right? Little enough that was. If he meddled 
now he would probably make things worse. 

“Don’t hurry away,” he said. “Have a drink, Errington.” 

Max accepted. “A quick one, though; we’re due to meet 
some people at the Savoy at ten. Must have been jolly in 
the country to-day,” he added. 

“Say when,” said Alan, squirting soda and thinking: 
“He’s got a nerve, anyway. He must be a bit rattled, won¬ 
dering whether I saw. Old hand at the game, I suppose. 
Women like a man who can carry things off.” 

“Your wife was in great form to-night,” Max observed. 
“Kept us amused all through dinner, didn’t she, Laura?” 

“I think she’s wonderful.” Laura’s tone betrayed the 
faintest tinge of nervousness. “Always taking things so 
cheerily. Come on, Max, or we’ll be late. No, never mind 
about a taxi, Alan. We’ll grab one off the rank at the end 
of the road. Thanks for the dinner, old dear.” 

Alan watched them walk down to the gate. Apparently 
they were completely unconcerned. “Damn that man!” he 
thought. “He’s dangerous; and Laura . . . Laura’s a silly 
little fool. I’ve got to do something. But what? What?” 

He shut the front door and turned to find Christine, still 
fully dressed, emerging from the lift. 

“Hullo!” he said. “Why, I thought you’d gone to bed.” 

“No, I was reading. I got a little bored with Max’s 
witticisms and Laura’s collection of smart stock phrases. 
As a pair, I find those two rather trying after a while. They 
seem to react on each other.” 

“They do,” observed Alan grimly. He told her what 
he had seen. “I said nothing,” he finished up, “because I 
wanted to discuss it with you first. But this has got to be 
stopped.” 

“Scarcely our affair, is it?” 


168 


THE BURDEN 


“It’s our house, Chris, and she’s my sister. You surely 
see that we oughtn’t to encourage it.” 

“There’s nothing so very awful in a kiss, is there?” 

“You didn’t see it. I did. No, don’t look at me as though 
you think I’m ridiculous to be shocked. I’m not shocked, 
I’m furious with Laura for making a fool of herself over 
this rotten fellow. It isn’t love, this, I’ll stake my life. It’s 
just a game for him and a dam’ dangerous bit of reckless¬ 
ness on her part. She doesn’t care for him seriously. She’d 
loathe to be married to him. And, anyway, he’s got a wife. 
Did you know that, by the way? If they go on like they’re 
doing there’ll be a crash. And that mustn’t happen.” 

“Well, what do you propose to do? Preach to Laura on 
her duty to her neglectful, unprepossessing husband? Or 
call Max a blackguardly homewrecker to his face?” Chris¬ 
tine’s tone was not pleasant. 

“Don’t sneer, Chris,” he said quietly. “It’s not like you 
to take this sort of thing as a joke. I’m going to talk to 
Laura. What I want you to do is to make it plain, tactfully, 
that we disapprove of their using our home as a . . .as 
a rendezvous. For that’s what it comes to: they’re always 
here, nowadays. And if you disappear upstairs and leave 
them together, as you did to-night—well, it looks as though 
you are in sympathy with them. You’re encouraging them. 
And I hate the thought of that. You see what I mean, don’t 
you, dear?” 

“Oh, rubbish!” retorted Christine, bluntly. “They’re 
attracted by each other. They’ll meet somewhere, whatever 
happens—even if we are offensive enough to forbid them 
our house. I’m not a particular admirer of Laura’s —you 
know that, well enough. But I’m sorry for her all the same. 
Ronny treats her pretty badly, that’s obvious. He’s coarse 
and he drinks, too. He doesn’t even attempt to study her 
side of the question. I don’t wonder she turns somewhere 
else for sympathy.” 

“But . . . steady on, Chris. You surely don’t . . .” 

“No, I don’t applaud her as in the right. I know quite 
well that she ought to sit patiently at home in the country 


ALAN 


169 

and feed the chickens and discuss the weather with the 
gardener, and be all smiles and cheerfulness when Ronny 
comes back from the City in the evening. But she isn’t 
that sort of woman. She wants gaiety, and life, and excite¬ 
ment. Very silly perhaps. Women are silly like that, but 
it’s a pity that more husbands don’t realise it and make 
allowances for it.” 

“Yes, yes, I know, darling,” he answered testily—fully 
aware of the implied reproach in her words. “But surely 
that’s no excuse for compromising herself with a man like 
Errington.” 

“It may not be an excuse, but it’s a reason. I take people 
as I find them. I have to. I’m so hopelessly dependent on 
people, you see. And, frankly, I don’t object to Max. He 
may be all that’s said of him. If so, it’s up to Laura to 
take care of herself. But he’s always been jolly thoughtful 
and considerate to me. He’s taken a lot of trouble to bring 
people here and to make things cheerful for me. He’s 
always prepared to be pleasant and interested.” She paused 
a moment. Then, in a tone of deliberate malice, she added: 

“He’s not absorbed in thoughts of himself and his own 
career.” 

“He’s not got a career. He’s not even got a job,” said 
Alan contemptuously. “He’s just ... oh, never mind 
that! The point is that we’re anxious about Laura.” 

“I’m not.” 

“Well, I am. I’m frightfully worried, Chris, and I’m 
asking you to help.” 

He was unable to explain to himself why he thus de¬ 
manded her help or what he expected of her. He only 
knew that her perversity in declining to see the matter 
from his point of view was profoundly irritating. It oc¬ 
curred to him to appeal to her affection for his father. 

“There’s Dad,” he said. “He’s dreadfully worried too. 
You know how straight he is himself. It would just about 
kill him, I think, if Laura went off the rails.” 

“Would it? Yes, I suppose it would. Because it’s a 
woman. But ...” She hesitated and looked at him 


THE BURDEN 


170 

stonily. “But supposing he discovered that you’d been ‘off 
the rails/ as you call it, he’d survive it, I’ve no doubt. 
Where’s the justice in that?” 

Alan did not answer her. There was no logical answer, 
he knew that. But it was only by a tremendous effort that 
he restrained himself from bursting out upon her: “How 
mean of you to drag up that, when you had forgiven me 
for it! How mean of you, how very mean!” It was what 
he felt, but he said—nothing. He just stared at her, with 
the pain that was in his heart showing in his eyes, and 
despair in his soul. She had not really forgiven him, then. 
Their reconciliation, their reinstatement on the old plane 
of understanding comradeship had been an illusion. The 
chasm between them gaped once more. It could never be 
bridged now. This was the end. 

“But do what you think best, Alan,” she said at last, 
coldly. “Don’t mind me. I’m not dependent on Max or 
Laura. I’ve other friends, thank Heaven. I suppose you 
are going to work now. I’m going up to bed. I’m tired.” 

He opened the lift gate for her. “Good-night,” he said. 

Alan had his talk with Laura. She simply declined to 
take him seriously. 

“My good Alan,” she said airily, “if it amuses me to 
tantalise the amorous Max, surely I may. If your house 
is too holy, however, I’ll not allow him to commit sacrilege 
in it again. But really, you know, I’m much better at 
looking after myself than you seem to think. And ... I 
say, Alan, it would be impertinent to ask, I suppose, if your 
kisses are entirely reserved for Christine?” 

“Yes, it would,” he replied, sharply. 

He dismissed Laura from his mind. 

“She’s a fool, but she’s all right, really, I think,” he told 
himself. “Anyway, it’s her look-out. I’ve enough worries 
of my own.” 

He had. He could put Laura and her affairs aside, but 
what he could not do was to prevent himself from brooding 
upon his own situation, and the more he thought about it 


ALAN 


171 


the more desperate it appeared to him—desperate, and 
yet with no tangible element in it with which he could deal. 
His reply to that terrible reminder of Christine’s remained 
unspoken. She had made no further reference to their 
conversation and had resumed her normal manner towards 
him. But he knew that every day they were further apart. 
He made heroic efforts to combat his own feeling of re¬ 
sentment and the feeling of antipathy produced by his 
resentment. 

“I will not give way to it,” he kept telling himself. “I’m 
expecting too much of her, poor child. Of course, she’s 
nervy and exacting, and enormously difficult to please. But 
it’s not her fault. It’s not her fault. I must remember that.” 

He perceived, after much thought, that the cause of their 
estrangement lay at least partly in himself. He was chafing 
because he was never free. He was too much cooped up 
with her. He was hampered and, therefore, was discon¬ 
tented. True, he was for ever exerting himself to conceal 
his discontent and to appear entirely satisfied. But the very 
effort required for that exhausted him and left him with no 
energy and no zest for more important things in his life. 
Thus his discontent was augmented. A vicious circle from 
which, apparently, there was no escape. He was hemmed 
in, a prisoner for life. But . . . but it was foolish—and 
weak—to regard the situation thus. He would have to 
think out some solution. There must be a solution, other¬ 
wise he would break under the strain. He must obtain time 
and a chance to think things out—not with her, but away 
from her. He had never been away from her for twenty- 
four hours since she had come back from the hospital after 
the accident. He ought to leave her for a while, so that 
he could set down his burden and re-adjust it before 
lifting it up again. If he had not given way to her and 
refused that job, he would have had three months alone, 
three months of relief—of rest. He would have had a chance 
to recuperate, and the position might have been very dif¬ 
ferent now. He had been a fool to give way; that was plain 
enough. Suddenly he made up his mind. Whatever she 


172 


THE BURDEN 


might say, whatever reproaches of selfishness and neglect 
she might make, he would go away for a time. He was 
certain that that was an essential to any possibility of 
establishing their relationship on a sounder, even if on a less 
pretentious, basis. He would go away for a fortnight or so, 
and he would walk and think. He would come back at 
the end of it refreshed, vigorous, resolute, with his plans 
for a re-modelled future settled and his mind swept clear 
of illusion and extravagant hopes—or fears. Something 
had got to be done, and this holiday was unquestionably 
the right course for him to take. It was, indeed, the only 
course. It was absolutely necessary for him. 


CHAPTER EIGHTEEN 


I SHOULD like to see this coast in a gale,” said Norman 
Vaizey. 

Alan shifted his rucksac more comfortably into the small 
of his back and finished lighting his pipe. 

“Jove, yes!” he agreed. “It all looks peaceful and harm¬ 
less enough now, but a north-wester driving a heavy sea 
against these rocks would make a pretty stirring sight. Still 
. . .I’m not grumbling at the look of things at this 
moment, all the same.” 

It was the fifth day of their walking tour, and the first 
really fine one they had had. They had started from Pen¬ 
zance and had reached Land’s End on the first evening. 
Then, in dull weather, with occasional drizzle to irritate 
them, they had followed the north Cornish coast through 
St. Ives and Newquay. They had left Newquay that morn¬ 
ing and were making for Padstow. It was mid-day, and 
they had stopped to eat their sandwiches at the top of 
the cliffs near Bedruthan steps. A cloudless sky, dominated 
by the hot June sun, met the blue sea in a belt of haze 
at an invisible horizon. A hundred feet below them, tiny 
waves, stirred by the faintest of breezes, caressed the rocks 
as though promising never again to grow rough and angry. 
Right and left of them stretched the iron grey cliffs of the 
broken, dangerous coast. Behind them were turf and gorse, 
and the winding path which they had been following all 
the morning. 

“The best walk so far and the best day for it,” Alan 
said. “I was getting tired of grey skies and muggy weather. 
But I don’t mind how hot it is so long as there is sun.” 

He stretched himself lazily. “By Jove! I’m enjoying 
this. I’m glad you brought me to this part of the world, 
Norman.” 


173 


THE BURDEN 


174 

It was quite true; he was enjoying himself. He had not 
forgotten his worries, but he had been able to keep them 
in the background of his mind. He was living in the present, 
and finding in Vaizey just the companion that he needed. 
Vaizey could both talk and listen, but he asked no awkward 
questions. 

“Cornwall is being spoilt,” said Vaizey now. “It’s been 
discovered. It’s being opened up—like China; and written 
up—like a smart French watering place. When droves of 
visitors invade an area, its individual character tends to 
disappear.” 

“Well, you can’t put up a fence and allow only a limited 
number of people through it each summer.” 

“I know, and of course it’s absurd to cavil. But one 
may be permitted—regrets. My chief regret is that Cornwall 
has become fashionable in fiction. There is a fashion, you 
know, in local colour. If some one were to write a notable 
novel with a setting in, say, the Fen country, there’d be a 
whole crop of books—bad books probably—with the same 
setting, and Ely would become a sort of pseudo-literary 
Mecca.” 

“Perhaps—but what of it?” asked Alan smiling. 

“It always annoys me, this fatuous imitation, that’s all. 
And I’m not sure that books written about a place and 
misinterpreting its character aren’t just as bad for it as a 
horde of visitors invading it. The place gets vulgarised. 
But, look here, we’d better be stepping on.” 

They returned to the path, and as they trudged eastwards 
Alan listened while Vaizey talked of books and the public 
taste therein. It was his argument that the present time 
was a period of transition. More people than ever before 
were reading something. Education, so-called, had at least 
done that much. But education had got to go beyond that; 
it had got to induce discrimination, choice, taste. That 
was what would happen in time—perhaps sooner than one 
might suppose. He asserted definitely that the standard of 
taste was already rising, and to prove his case he quoted 


ALAN 


175 

facts from his knowledge of the market fortunes of a large 
number of modern books. He talked with enthusiasm. 

“Old Norman,” thought Alan, “is becoming idealistic— 
almost absurdly so for him. He really believes in the early 
regeneration of public taste. But if I were to assert that 
we are on the eve of a renaissance in domestic architecture, 
he’d scoff and produce all sorts of evidence to the contrary. 
Amusing!” 

Vaizey had referred to the sex theme in modern novels. 

“It’s treated much more openly and much more truly 
now, don’t you think?” Alan suggested. 

“But it’s being overdone, or, at any rate, over-empha¬ 
sised. Lord, to read some of these books—most of them, 
in fact, even those which have serious pretensions—you’d 
think that every human being was preoccupied with sex 
for twenty-four hours a day from the schoolroom to the 
grave! But it isn’t so. Sex is an incidental, really. Vastly 
important, perhaps, but still an incidental. Yet it’s treated 
as though it were the sole factor in life.” 

“It’s the dominating factor,” Alan disputed. “It ought 
not to be, perhaps, but it is.” 

“Has Freud got a new disciple?” Vaizey asked with a 
smile. 

“Not necessarily. But I’ve got eyes.” He walked some 
twenty yards in silence before adding: “And feelings.” 

He was aware of his companion’s quick glance at him, but 
no question followed the glance. 

“I’m right, Norman,” Alan said. “Sex is the dominating 
factor. We can’t get away from it. Somehow or other, 
directly or indirectly, it affects everything we do. I mean 
sex in its broadest sense, of course—the general relationship 
between men and women.” 

Vaizey nodded. 

“Civilisation, it seems to me, has made it all so com¬ 
plex,” Alan went on. “It affects us in so many unexpected 
ways—unconsciously for the most part, perhaps—that it is 
a hindrance; more than a hindrance, an almost intolerable 
burden.” 


THE BURDEN 


176 

“Surely that’s a very exaggerated way of looking at it?” 

“Well, take my own case. I’m a normal man and . . 

“But your circumstances—forgive me, Alan—are not 
normal.” 

“No; and so I’ve had an unusual opportunity to test 
both the power and the limitations of the strongest impulse 
in human nature.” 

“Well?” 

“It’s breaking me, that’s all. I can’t get away from it. 
I can’t devote myself as I should to other things: my work, 
for instance. It dominates my mind, it obtrudes, it inter¬ 
feres, it exasperates—and yet it entices.” 

“You’re letting it do so,” answered Vaizey quietly. 
“You’re worried and you’re letting this become an obsession. 
It oughtn’t to be and it needn’t be. Look here, old man, 
don’t tell me more than you want to, but tell me all that you 
can. What’s the real trouble?” 

“The real trouble,” said Alan slowly, “is that I’ve dis¬ 
covered that circumstances are too hard for me, and I funk 
the future. God, how I dread the future!” 

“I know ... I understand. But you must not let your¬ 
self stay in that frame of mind. You’ve got to force yourself 
to believe that the future is not going to be harder for you, 
but gradually easier.” 

“Easier! How can perpetual conflict against increasing 
odds become easier?” 

“Life is conflict. You agreed with me in that, I 
remember. 

“Yes, but ... it must be the right sort of conflict, 
don’t you see? And mine isn’t—now. Listen, Norman, 
and you’ll see what I mean. Listen while I tell you the 
whole thing. It may be wrong of me to tell you—disloyal 
to Chris, perhaps—but I want you to know. I want you 
to realise how matters stand, and then perhaps you can 
advise me, help me.” 

Alan unburdened himself. Mile after mile the two of 
them tramped side by side, with Vaizey listening in almost 


ALAN 177 

complete silence and Alan talking almost without reserve of 
his relationship with Christine. 

“We were lovers/ 5 he explained. “You must get that 
clear. Real lovers in the finest sense of the word. We shared 
ideals—great ideals. We were tremendous comrades, too. 
We 5 d had to fight desperately hard for each other and that 
brought us together in a complete understanding as, per¬ 
haps, nothing else would have done. We were absolutely 
frank with each other—as frank as any two persons can 
ever be. We started our life together, therefore, with every 
advantage and with every hope. And we would have made 
a success of it, I know we would, if this frightful thing 
hadn’t happened. And when it happened, Norman, we 
forced ourselves to look upon it as a test of our love for 
each other. If we were strong enough to face it with a 
smile and to refuse to let it make a difference, if we could 
remain faithful to each other, comrades and mental lovers, 
then we would have proved that our love was the splendid 
thing which we had always asserted that it was. But it 
hasn’t turned out like that.” 

He described at length the gradual opening of the rift 
between himself and Christine; the accumulation of little 
things which, in the end, produced exasperation, antagonism, 
distrust, antipathy. He described his own temptations, his 
struggle against them, his defeat. 

“It was hell,” he said, “hell! Yet afterwards, when I’d 
told her and she’d been so wonderful with her understanding 
and her forgiveness, I was almost glad that it had happened. 
I thought it would be possible to begin again. I thought I’d 
got a fresh chance and that I could take it. We were back 
on the old level of trust and comradeship for a while—or 
so I felt. But—it didn’t last. It isn’t possible to get back. 
I see that now. And she hasn’t really forgiven. I’m not 
blaming her—don’t think that. She believes she has. But 
this thing rankles in her mind—unconsciously, perhaps. 
Naturally, I suppose. And it’s left its mark upon her soul. 
She’s not normal, you see. For her everything is distorted. 
And that makes her terribly difficult to deal with and to live 


THE BURDEN 


178 

with. I’ve tried to explain to you what it’s like—that inci¬ 
dent of making me give up a damned fine job is an outstand¬ 
ing example; she’d never have done that if she’d been her¬ 
self. But if I talked to you for a week I couldn’t make you 
really understand how great the strain is. No one could 
know without going through it. It’s all intensified by the 
fact that she’s helpless, an invalid with whom one must 
keep one’s temper and for whom one must always be making 
allowances. My God! the effort of making allowances all 
the time! And it is all leading to—nothing. That’s the 
appalling fact. There’s no objective. That’s what I meant 
when I said just now that mine isn’t the right sort of con¬ 
flict. If one fights, one fights to win. But I’ve got to fight 
all my life, and I can’t win anything. I’m using up all my 
energy, and all my strength, and all my youth to no 
purpose.” 

“Yes, to a purpose,” protested Vaizey. 

“No, Norman. Oh! I know what you mean. A splendidly 
useless asceticism. It sounds noble, I agree. But is it? Is 
it really? It can serve no end that I can see. And I shall 
fail in the end. I’ve failed once already, remember. But 
put that aside for a moment. Assume that I can be physi¬ 
cally faithful from now on. That’s only the beginning of 
the matter. There’s the question of my work. I’m desper¬ 
ately keen about my work—absurdly ambitious I expect 
you’ll say.” 

“That’s where your salvation lies.” 

“It ought to. But it can’t, in these circumstances. That’s 
just the point. Didn’t I say that sex—taken in its broadest 
sense—obtrudes, dominates? That’s what I meant. The 
question of Chris, my relations with her, my struggle to 
do the right thing by her—it dominates my life, don’t you 
understand?” 

“You—must—not—let it.” 

“But I tell you I can’t help myself, Norman. You’ll think 
me an awful egoist, I expect, but I’ve reached a stage 
when I simply must talk to some one. This is what I’ve 
come to feel: when Chris and I were engaged and first mar- 


ALAN 


179 

ried she was my standby; she was a constant inspiration to 
me in my work. That sounds high-flown nonsense to you, 
perhaps. But it’s a fact, all the same. She kept my ambi¬ 
tions high. She encouraged me. She showed me that she 
neither desired nor intended to come between me and my 
work. In fact, and in short, she was an ideal helpmate. 
But now—oh! it’s no use pretending the contrary—she’s 
definitely and continuously a hindrance. Again, I’m not 
blaming her. But that’s the position. Not only has she lost 
interest, but she’s making me lose interest. She’s sapping 
my power to concentrate on the career I want to make for 
myself. Good Lord! two years, eighteen months ago, I was 
full of plans and full of determination. I felt that I had 
the ability and strength, and, as a matter of fact, the oppor¬ 
tunity, to make something really worth while of my life. 
But now . . . but now all that is slipping away from me. 
I’m done. I’m tied, Norman, I’m tied. Tell me what to do. 
For God’s sake show me some way of escape.” 

It was a moment or two before Vaizey answered. 

“It would be easy,” he said, thoughtfully, “to give you 
sanctimonious advice; to tell you to grin and make the 
most of it by compromising. But it wouldn’t be honest. 
You can’t compromise. You’ve got two alternatives and no 
middle course. You can either give up your work—the part 
of it which really matters, I mean—and devote yourself 
entirely to your wife’s interests. Or you can abandon your 
wife—metaphorically speaking—and stick to your work. 
But you can’t do both. If you try to do both, you’ll succeed 
in neither. Of that I’m certain.” 

“But . . . damn it all! I can’t abandon Chris. What 
exactly do you mean by that, anyway?” 

“I don’t suggest your deserting her. But, assuming your 
decision to be for your work, you’ll have to make it plain 
to her that you must lead your own life unhampered by 
her or by any concern of hers. At whatever cost to her 
feelings, or your own, you’ll have to be frank, brutally 
frank, in explaining that henceforth no consideration for 
her is going to be allowed to interfere with your work. And, 


180 


THE BURDEN 


having explained, you’ll have to steel yourself to carry out 
your resolution. You will go your way and she, poor girl, 
will stay in hers. It won’t be easy for you—at first. You’ll 
find it regrettably easy later on.” 

“And the other way?” Alan asked. 

“Chuck your ambitions. Give up all idea of big achieve¬ 
ments in your career. Jog along at your office job in a 
quiet, unpretentious way. Reserve all your energy and all 
your ingenuity for the task of lightening Christine’s burden. 
Devote yourself entirely to her. Sacrifice everything in 
your life to her.” 

“That’s what I’ve been trying to do—not very success¬ 
fully, I admit.” 

“No, because you haven’t given up—the rest.” 

“You’ve put the situation in the most damnable way, 
Norman. I hadn’t dared to think of it like that. It’s a 
hellish choice to have to make.” 

“It is—if you still love her.” 

“Love her! Of course, I love her. At least ... as much 
as I can, in the circumstances. But . . . oh, I don’t know 
. . . My God! I don’t know. Is it love still, or is it just 
pity? There have been times when I have almost hated her. 
I’ve been exasperated, worn out by her. I’ve had all my 
nerves on edge. And sometimes I’ve been convinced that 
she hated me. But . . . there’s the past ... all those 
past memories of happiness together, and hopes and thrills 
shared. We can never be the same again . . . and yet. 
Oh! Hell!” 

They walked some distance before either spoke again. 
It was Vaizey who resumed. 

» “I can’t quite see it as you do,” he said quietly, “so don’t 
think that in giving you my own view I’m anxious to influ¬ 
ence you in your decision. For me, a man’s work, if it’s 
work that is really worth doing, comes before everything.” 

“Well, I agree—in theory. But in practice, look what 
happens.” 

“But only if it’s allowed to happen; only if one permits 
sentiment to interfere. It’s a ruthless theory, I suppose— 


ALAN 


181 


one that implies ruthlessness in conduct, anyway. But I 
believe in it. If a man has faith in his own power to achieve 
something worth achieving, he is not justified in jeopardis¬ 
ing his career on any grounds whatever. It’s better to ‘make 
good’ than merely to be kind or unselfish.” 

“Yes, I think that, too—until I come to apply it to my 
own case. But—” 

“In your own case especially. Listen, Alan. You call me 
a cynic sometimes, but I’m not really. I believe that a 
better future for the world is possible. But I’m sure, quite 
sure, that it can only be brought about by a prodigious 
effort. And now, if ever, is the time for it. The world is in 
a state of flux; anything may happen. But something must 
happen. It’s up to any man who cares for civilisation to 
do his bit for it with whatever strength and talents he may 
possess. I don’t mean standing on a tub and shouting for 
revolution. Any fanatic, or any poor disillusioned hungry 
devil can do that. But I mean taking an active and intelli¬ 
gent share—however humble it may be—in sorting out the 
tangle and altering things. If people like ourselves, who 
feel that there is so much which is wrong and . . . and 
silly, just sit and fold our hands helplessly in despair, civili¬ 
sation will go under. My job is insignificant enough, I 
know. Upholding the good books and damning the trash 
won’t have startlingly impressive results. But every effort 
counts, and—well, people are influenced by what they read. 
Literature is a reflection of life and ought to be a guide 
to it. Anyway, that’s my line. But yours, if you see your 
way to taking it, is much less vague. Do you remember 
that night when I was dining at your father’s house, before 
you were married? Do you remember his saying—to Chris¬ 
tine, I think —apropos the housing question: ‘You can’t 
expect people to think decently unless they live decently’? 
Well, there’s your chance, Alan. I’m not making any wild 
claims for you. I’m not expecting you to solve the housing 
problem in six months, and accommodate the entire popula¬ 
tion in artistic villas in ten, or even fifty years. But you 
can do something. You’ve got talent and energy, and means 


THE BURDEN 


182 

and a chance—a God-sent chance. You’ll be up against 
tremendous opposition; rings and vested interests, reaction¬ 
ary-minded persons with influence, who are fearful that 
if the people live better they will become even more dan¬ 
gerous. There’s conflict for you—the right sort of conflict, 
and no mistake about it. There’s a job worth putting your 
hand to, worth devoting your life to, Alan, old man.” 

“I know. Good Lord! do you think I don’t know all that? 
I don’t say I’d get far, or do much that would really count. 
But—oh! I wanted so much to have a fling at it. I’d begun, 
too, you see. I’d had just enough success at the start to 
make me impatiently eager to go ahead. But there’s Chris, 
there’s always Chris. Damn it! I owe her too much to for¬ 
sake her now, when she needs me. I must put her first. I 
must be faithful to her.” 

Again Alan was conscious of Vaizey’s quick, penetrating 
glance. 

“Will you be? Can you be?” demanded Vaizey, bluntly. 

“Don’t think me impertinent for asking that,” he went 
on. “For most men sex is an incidental—in spite of your 
argument to the contrary just now. There are exceptions, 
and you might have been one; very likely you would have 
been if things had gone right with you. But I gravely 
doubt it now. In chucking your work, you’ll be suppressing 
your creative instinct, and you’ve got it strongly developed, 
mind you. You’ll feel yourself thwarted, baulked. You’ll 
need some other outlet; you’ll be unable to resist the tempta¬ 
tion to obtain that outlet. Sooner or later, you’ll give 
way. You simply will not be able to remain faithful.” 

“No,” exclaimed Alan vehemently. “No. It won’t be 
like that again.” 

“Inevitably it will. You admitted as much yourself a 
little while ago. T shall fail again in the end,’ you said. 

“I was speaking recklessly. I feel differently now. I 
feel I can stick it. And, in spite of your opinion, I’m going 
to compromise. I’m going back to Christine at the end of 
this tour and I’m going to put things before her. I’m going 
to make her understand. I shan’t abandon her. Far from 


ALAN 


183 


it. I shall get her on my side again. It can be done, I 
swear it can. You don’t know her as I do, Norman. I’ve 
only got to make her see. I’ve been bottling up my worries 
instead of being frank with her—that’s been the trouble. 
But things will be on a different footing from now on.” 

Vaizey smiled and laid his hand affectionately on Alan’s 
shoulder for a second. “Good luck to you, anyway,” he 
said. 

They swung down the hill into Padstow. 

“A wash, a damned good tea, and then, perhaps, a bathe,” 
suggested Alan. “I feel as healthy and as fit as ever I did 
in my life. That’s a reasonably decent-looking pub over 
there. Shall we try for a room?” 


CHAPTER NINETEEN 


F RESH air, plain food and hard exercise had their 
beneficial effect upon Alan. It was as though he 
were convalescent after an illness, as though his brain had 
been numbed for weeks and even months, and now strength 
and vigour were flowing back into it. Feeling physically 
fit and hard and mentally refreshed, he was convinced 
that he had been wise in his decision to take this holiday. 
A respite was all that he had needed, and the respite had 
set him right again. With his self-confidence restored to 
him he could now view the situation calmly and sensibly 
and could face the future with far less misgiving. He felt 
strong again, and as the tour neared its end he became 
almost eager to return home and prove to himself—and to 
Christine—that it was possible to establish a new and 
wholly satisfactory relationship between them. 

He had not discussed the matter further with Vaizey. 
The latter, having been asked for his help and advice, had 
given it willingly and frankly enough. But at that he had 
stopped. Alan’s reticence, following his sudden outburst 
of confidences, was indicative that his decision was made; 
he was resolved upon compromise. Vaizey, therefore, did 
not feel justified in pressing his own point of view. Yet he 
was convinced that his view was the right one. That which 
was dynamic could never harmonise with that which was 
static; and Alan, with his vigour, his enthusiasms, his high 
ambitions and the strong strain of egoism in his character, 
would always be dynamic, just as Christine, by force of 
circumstances, was condemned always to be static. The 
situation was unstable, and Vaizey doubted Alan’s ability 
to maintain it; he doubted the ability of any man to do 
so under such conditions. He was afraid for his friend. But 
he said no more. . . . 


184 


ALAN 


185 


For the last day but one of their tour they had planned 
the longest walk of all—from west to east across Exmoor. 
Starting from Cheleham, whither they had taken the train 
from Barnstaple, they walked twelve rough moorland miles 
to Simonsbath, where they lunched. The map showed an 
inn at Wheddon Cross, another twelve miles on, and they 
agreed to take their chance of getting a room there rather 
than allow themselves to be diverted from their route. Tired 
and thirsty, they reached the inn at six in the evening and 
were informed by a surly landlord that he did not let rooms. 
He further informed them that he knew of nowhere in 
the village where they could get a room and that he could 
not give them a meal. He provided them, almost grudg¬ 
ingly, with pint tankards of shandygaff and returned to 
his newspaper. 

“Damn!” said Alan. “How far is Dunster, Norman?” 

“Nearly seven—and if we go on there it will throw us 
out for to-morrow. Let’s try the shop opposite.” 

They went across and consulted a dark, pleasant-faced 
woman whom they found inside. She agreed with them 
that the landlord of the inn was a surly lout and informed 
them that nobody liked him. “But his’n is the only ‘public’ 
within four mile,” she explained with a smile. 

“And it’s called the ‘Rest and be Thankful/ I see,” said 
Alan grimly. 

The woman was doubtful of their obtaining a room any¬ 
where. “Wait, though,” she added. “You might try up to 
Mrs. Dighton’s. She’s from London, and she’s taken the 
whole cottage. There’s only herself and her niece, so there 
should be an extra room. The last house on the right up 
the lane behind here is it. You can’t miss it.” 

When they were outside Vaizey said: “The thing to do 
is to play the idiot boy—pretend we thought they let rooms, 
and then look dam’ tired.” 

“I can do that all right,” Alan said. 

They found the cottage easily enough. It stood back a 
few yards from the lane, and a red brick path led through 
its small front garden up to a green door. A grey-haired 


THE BURDEN 


186 

woman was sitting reading in a deck chair on a patch of 
sunburnt grass. 

“Excuse me,” said Vaizey, “but is this Mrs. Dighton’s?” 

The woman looked up and removed a large pair of 
spectacles. 

“Yes, I’m Mrs. Dighton. Good afternoon,” she replied. 

“No go!” thought Alan, noticing her soft, refined voice. 
“Wouldn’t be right to impose ourselves upon her.” 

“They told us down at the village,” said Vaizey, “that 
we might be able to hire a room here for the night. There’s 
not one at the inn, it appears, which was rather a shock 
to us.” 

Mrs. Dighton stood up. She was a little woman with 
grey eyes which looked searchingly out of a nest of wrin¬ 
kles. She wore no hat, and her grey hair showed its abun¬ 
dance above a calm, unfurrowed forehead. She might have 
been rather more than sixty. She was pale. 

“But I’m a tenant here myself, you know,” she said. 
“I’ve only leased the cottage for the summer.” 

“I must apologise,” Vaizey said. “I’m afraid we mis¬ 
understood. We stupidly got the impression that this was 
an ordinary cottage where they would take in travellers.” 

The little lady smiled. “It’s a very ordinary cottage,” 
she said, “and there’s no need to apologise. Have you 
come far? It must have been hot walking. Won’t you 
come in and rest for a minute or two?” 

“We’ve come right across Exmoor—a ripping walk.” 
It was Alan who spoke now. He liked Mrs. Dighton’s ap¬ 
pearance, and he particularly liked the cool look of the cot¬ 
tage interior, which he could see through the open window 
behind her head. He stood with one dusty shoe crossed 
over the other, in a pose deliberately meant to be weary. 

“We’d better be getting on, Norman,” he said, without 
enthusiasm. 

“Right across Exmoor! But my gracious, you must be 
exhausted!” Mrs. Dighton’s voice became suddenly one of 
almost motherly concern. She dropped the book which 


ALAN 187 

she was holding and Vaizey picked it up for her. He looked 
at the title. It was Shaw’s “Back to Methuselah.” 

“Brilliant, isn’t it?” he said. 

“Rather deep for me. But I’m struggling with it, slowly. 
And thinking hard. But look here, you poor men can’t go 
tramping any further to-night. I’ve a room here, rather 
tiny, but if you don’t mind sharing a bed I’d be delighted if 
you’d have it for the night.” 

“It’s most awfully good of you, Mrs. Dighton,” Alan 
began, “but why should you bother and ...” 

“And how do you know we are respectable?” added 
Vaizey. 

She laughed; a very friendly laugh it was. “I always 
assume people are respectable until I discover that they 
aren’t,” she declared. “It’s pleasanter, and not really so 
very dangerous. Besides, you admire Shaw. And that’s 
something of a guarantee. He’s an idol of mine.” 

“But are you certain ...” 

“I say, it’s extraordinarily kind ...” 

She interrupted them both. “Not a bit. It will be fun. 
We’ve got some eggs and ham, I know. My niece will be 
back soon. Do come in. I expect you’d like a wash.” 

She led them inside and smilingly shook hands as each 
introduced the other. 

“My friend, Alan Carnes—designer of model villages.” 

“My friend, Norman Vaizey—professional slaughterer 
of bad books. A critic, in fact.” 

She knew Vaizey by name. “How very interesting!” she 
said. “This is your room. Can you both get into it at once? 
—just. One moment, and I’ll get you some towels.” 

“What a delightful person!” said Alan, when she had 
left them. 

“She’s suffered in her life. Did you notice her eyes?” 
answered Vaizey, raising his tanned face from the basin. “I 
wonder what the niece is like.” 

“Lord! but we’ve been lucky. I didn’t want to do those 
seven miles into Dunster. Tell you what, Norman. You 
can argue about Shaw with the old lady, while I slip down 


THE BURDEN 


188 

to the village and forage for provisions. We’ll be like locusts 
in this place, otherwise.” 

“Good idea!” he agreed. “Take your rucksac with you 
and remember to bring some beer.” 

Refreshed, they descended to the living room and found 
their hostess searching for extra plates. Alan explained that 
he wanted some tobacco, and departed. He returned in half 
an hour with his rucksac bulging and clinking. 

“Our contribution!” he said gaily, as he dumped it on 
the table. And then he was aware of the presence of a 
fourth person. 

“This is my niece, Miss Regnart, Mr. Carnes.” 

She half rose from the wicker chair in which she was 
sitting in shadow and shook hands with him. Then she 
sat back again in her chair, stretched brown-stockinged 
legs, ending in rough brogues, out in front of her and clasped 
her hands behind her head. He got the impression that she 
was physically tired and rather shy. 

“How very kind of you! Why this will be a regular 
feast,” Mrs. Dighton was saying, as she spread out the 
contents of the rucksac. “Noel, we’ve got some salad oil 
somewhere, haven’t we? And vinegar?” 

“Yes, Aunt Evelyn. I’ll get it. I know where it is.” 

She stood up and moved round the table towards the 
kitchen door. She moved easily, gracefully. She was of 
medium height with rather square-set shoulders, but with 
a neck that was undeniably beautiful. Her neck, springing 
bare from a low cut jumper of mauve silk, and the poise 
of her head, with its suggestion of strength and independence 
of character, compelled attention. 

“A sturdy sort of person,” thought Alan; and he looked at 
her again when she returned. He noticed her hands, firm, 
clever-looking hands; and her hair—particularly her hair. 
Its colour reminded him—of what? Of polished rust? If 
rust could be made to shine, he decided, it would be the 
colour of her hair. Strange to find such hair surmounting 
so dark a skin. The contrast was unusual, attractive. 


ALAN 189 

“Ready!” announced Mrs. Dighton. “Tell me when 
it’s four minutes from now and I’ll fetch in the eggs.” 

It was a pleasant meal. There was no affectation and 
no shyness about Mrs. Dighton. She was kindly, observant 
of everybody’s wants, and evidently delighted with her role 
as hostess. 

“Noel,” she said, “we must go to the post office to-morrow 
and thank Mrs. Foster for having recommended these 
distinguished travellers to our cottage.” 

“You’d better know first, then,” laughed Alan, “that the 
distinguished, but unscrupulous, travellers were aware that 
you were not a professional landlady. But they pretended 
to think so because they coveted your vacant room.” 

“They apologise—very humbly.” Vaizey bowed across 
the table and smiled. “For the love of Shaw, forgive them.” 

“They are forgiven.” Mrs. Dighton smiled back at him. 

“But don’t imagine you took Aunt Evelyn in,” Noel 
interposed, with an affectionate glance at the elder woman. 
“It can’t be done. Aunt Evelyn knew quite well that Mrs. 
Foster would have told you that we were ‘from London’ 
and had leased the cottage. She always does say that. 
She’s rather proud of it.” She sprang up. “But the eggs! 
We’ve forgotten all about them.” 

The eggs, unfortunately, were boiled hard. But no one 
minded. Friendliness was definitely established. 

Conversation passed easily, from comments on the local 
countryside and on the pleasures of a walking tour, to more 
personal matters. The two women, it appeared, lived to¬ 
gether in a small flat “supposed to be Westminster but actu¬ 
ally Pimlico,” in Noel’s phrase. Aunt Evelyn was a child¬ 
less widow and Noel an orphan. Noel had qualified as a 
doctor in 1917, had done much hospital work during the 
latter stages of the war, but had no post at the moment. 

“Except to look after Aunt Evelyn,” she explained, smil¬ 
ing, “and that’s no small job. She’s the most reckless 
person with her own health. She will try to do too much.” 

Aunt Evelyn, it appeared, divided her life between 
cultivating a garden of hope and faith in an extensive slum 


THE BURDEN 


190 

district and active propaganda for the Independent Labour 
Party. She was a paradox: a revolutionary with an abhor¬ 
rence of physical force in any form, from a street fight to 
a world war. And her efforts for what, with unashamed 
and vehement partisanship, she referred to proudly as “The 
Cause,” combined with her slum work, had caused a serious 
breakdown. Noel had carried her off to this inaccessible 
country cottage with every intention of keeping her there 
till the autumn. 

“And you yourself,” Alan asked, “are you going to take up 
private practice?” 

She shrugged her shoulders. “I haven’t the capital to 
buy one and, in any case, it doesn’t'appeal to me. I’d like 
a public job. Assistant medical officer of health or some¬ 
thing like that.” 

He began to ask her questions about the medical pro¬ 
fession, particularly as regards its women members. Aunt 
Evelyn had already begun to talk a mixture of politics 
and Bernard Shaw with Vaizey. 

“I’m a strong feminist,” Noel said. “Not just the vote 
mania—though I was a fiery enthusiast over that in my 
youth. But that’s a bye-product. It’s the ‘woman depend¬ 
ent on man’ view of society that I hate. Do you agree? 
Or do you believe in the ‘dominating male’ idea?” 

“I don’t incline to it from choice,” he answered. “But I 
accept it as likely to remain true for a very long while yet. 
Speaking generally, of course.” He smiled. “There are 
obvious exceptions.” 

“Many more than you think, perhaps. Women are learn¬ 
ing with astonishing quickness. The war helped them a lot. 
There is at least that much to its credit.” 

They discussed the point at some length, Alan arguing 
that the chance conditions of any given period could pro¬ 
duce no extensive change in human nature, which inevitably 
could only develop by imperceptible degrees; and Noel 
answering that it was not a question of changing human 
nature, but merely of giving it freedom of expression. 

She talked with animation, meeting his eyes and his ques- 


ALAN 


191 


tions frankly and straightforwardly. He was interested in 
her; not only in her opinions and in her quick mind, but 
also in her personality. There was, so he felt, something 
mysterious about her. She meant what she said—that much 
was obvious. But, for all her apparent frankness, it was 
also obvious that she was thinking a great deal more than 
she was putting into words. She seemed to be holding much 
of herself in reserve. She was friendly, but not in the least 
‘‘pally” in the sense that his sister Laura was “pally.” An 
independent person, knowing her own mind and choosing 
her own path, he decided. “No man would be likely to 
dominate you,” he thought to himself. 

“You’re married, aren’t you?” she asked suddenly; and 
then, with a challenging look: “I thought so from the way 
you talked. There’s a particular way in which married men 
use the word ‘women’—‘Women do this, women do that’— 
that gives away the fact that they are thinking of the one 
individual woman whom they know best.” 

He told her then of the accident and of Christine’s para¬ 
lyzed condition. 

“I’m very sorry,” she said simply. But he saw her eyes— 
dark green eyes splashed with brown—expressing sympathy 
and understanding. In the second in which he looked into 
them he felt that he was being granted a glimpse behind 
her baffling reserve. And then her aunt leant across to ask 
her a question and the talk became general. 

It was an invigorating talk which lasted till nearly mid¬ 
night. They were all, in a sense, progressives; all were 
imbued with a faith in human destiny and a real interest in 
human affairs. Between Aunt Evelyn, on the uncompromis¬ 
ing left, and Alan, on the cautious, thoughtful right, there 
was a difference in the methods to be used but not, in 
essence, in the end to be attained. “Hasten slowly. Look 
where you’re going. Keep what is good and use it as a 
foundation.” Thus Alan, with the influence of his father’s 
Gladstonian Liberalism behind him. 

“Nothing is good. There is no foundation. There can’t 
be, because the whole system is radically wrong.” Thus 


THE BURDEN 


192 

Aunt Evelyn, with her grey eyes shining and her pale face 
lit by enthusiasm. 

Between them came Noel, eager, too, but less practical, 
less ready to put her faith in any party or in any concerted 
programme; and Vaizey, a good-humoured scoffer, acting as 
a foil to Aunt Evelyn’s assertive vigour of denunciation. 
Aunt Evelyn showed a positively devastating ability to 
delve into the past for causes and into human nature for 
motives. It was evident that she knew more about life on 
so many shillings a week than about life on so many thou¬ 
sands a year. She was a storehouse of facts about the 
workings of human society, and she was passionately vehe¬ 
ment in her condemnation of its injustices and its inequali¬ 
ties. But she was a partisan, delightfully a partisan. For 
her the Left was consistently right, and all other parties 
consistently wrong and wicked in their various degrees of 
reaction. Alan listened to her, watched her expression of 
concentrated ardour while she defended the faith that was in 
her, and positively loved her for her sincerity and her 
enthusiasm. 

“She makes the mistake they all make,” he told himself. 
“She divides the world into the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’ 
—which isn’t a fair division to start with—and then she 
assumes that the triumph of the ‘have-nots’ would produce 
the millennium—which it certainly wouldn’t. But she’s an 
exceptionally knowledgeable woman, all the same.” 

She had mentioned housing conditions. She spoke from 
inside knowledge and was supported by Noel. 

“Housing?” said Vaizey, and nodded in Alan’s direction. 
“Here’s an expert, full of schemes. It’s his obsession. Make 
him talk, Miss Regnart.” 

Alan was reluctant at first; he would have to reveal so 
much of himself, he felt, if he began on that subject. But 
they drew him on; Aunt Evelyn by a brisk attack on “capi¬ 
talist contractors and their exorbitant profits,” which made 
him laughingly protest; Vaizey by affectionate chaff, and 
Noel by a direct command. 

“I’ve seen the bad side. Tell me of the good,” she said. 


ALAN 193 

“Defend your middle course, your ‘hastening slowly’ and 
being practical, against Aunt Evelyn’s ‘clean sweep.’ ” 

He told them first of the Chingford village. 

“It’s a very small beginning, mind you,” he said. 

“But it isn’t a new idea, and there’s private enterprise 
behind it,” objected Aunt Evelyn. “Therefore—profits first 
and public benefit a poor second.” 

“Our firm is losing steadily,” Alan answered her. “We’ve 
gone on because we—because my father is genuinely in 
earnest, Mrs. Dighton.” 

“Don’t condemn unheard and unseen, Aunt Evelyn,” put 
in Noel. 

“You ought to see it for yourself,” Vaizey said. “He’s 
right; it is a beginning. But go on, Alan.” 

“We’re contractors, certainly, but we’re not in the rings. 
We’re lucky enough to be able to stay outside and yet 
carry on. We hate them, I assure you, every bit as much 
as you do. We’re not out for big profits, and we are out to 
do the work well, to help. Give us credit for that.” 

“You find yourself up against a lot?” Noel put the ques¬ 
tion, leaning forward with her elbows resting on the table 
and her chin in her hands. 

“A lot! Let me tell you.” He was eager now to talk. 
He was aware of a curious sense of encouragement. Vaizey, 
he knew, was sympathetic, but these two strangers seemed 
so quick to grasp his points and to comment sensibly upon 
them, so ready to accept him as a serious worker in a big 
field of experiment, so anxious to probe his exact meaning. 
He launched out into a detailed description of the obstacles 
that were for ever facing the firm’s projects—the rings, 
the combines, the forcing-up of prices, the scarcity of mate¬ 
rial, the trade jealousies, the general economic situation, the 
antipathy between capital and labour, the tremendous secret 
power of vested interests. 

“It all hampers us, you see,” he said. “If we had a capital 
so large that we could defy all that, I believe we could go 
right ahead and lay the foundations of something really 
big.” 


THE BURDEN 


194 

But Aunt Evelyn shook her head. “There are plenty of 
concerns with^vast capitals,” she said, “but they don’t go 
right ahead, as you say, or, at any rate, not in the sense that 
you mean. Private enterprise is a proved failure. There’s 
only one course—nationalisation. The State is the only 
concern that has the economic power to do what should 
be done. The State—properly organised—could do it.” 

“Granted, if you like,” retorted Alan. “But since we 
are a long way from that, is it right to sit still and do 
nothing? I don’t think so. And I believe that there are 
great possibilities even in the present situation. People 
want decent homes. If they can be provided on a small 
scale at a reasonable cost, the fact will gradually become 
known, and the clamour for more will begin and will in¬ 
crease. That’s our aim. Think what could be done.” 

He enlarged upon his idea of what could be done. 
Prompted by his own longing for personal achievement, 
he became enthralled by his theme and talked on and on. 
In that cottage living-room, with the remains of supper 
pushed aside; with Aunt Evelyn busy making tea, but 
yet critically attentive to every word he said; with Norman 
Vaizey egging him on with here and there a friendly com¬ 
ment and here and there an encouraging approving nod; 
with the pleasant languor following hard exercise contrasting 
queerly with the sensation of controlling a brain that was 
quite extraordinarily wide awake; and with Noel’s eyes fixed 
upon him, he saw, through a haze of tobacco smoke, an 
entrancing vision of the great things that might be done, 
the great things that he himself had it in him to do. He 
knew that for those few golden moments he was holding 
the others spellbound. And then he dropped to earth again 
with an apologetic smile. 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve been romancing, I’m afraid. 
We are generations away from all that yet.” 

“But no— no !”—Aunt Evelyn’s thin, shapely fingers 
gripped the arms of her wicker chair—“not necessarily 
generations away! It might be to-morrow, or the next day, 
or the day after—if only ... oh, it’s my faith, that! 


ALAN 


195 


You’ve put it in terms of the housing of the people, but I 
believe that it’s wider than that. I believe what you have 
been suggesting as the line of progress applies not merely 
to the provision of houses, but to the whole conduct of 
human life. Co-operation for the general good instead of 
privileges for the selected few. You belong to us, Mr. 
Carnes, even if you don’t admit it yet.” 

She turned her head suddenly. 

“Noel, you’ve been very quiet. What do you think?” 

Noel was sitting back in her chair in the same attitude 
in which Alan had first seen her—with her feet outstretched 
and her hands behind her head. Her eyes were half-veiled. 
She seemed to be staring beyond the reality of the room 
through some window giving upon a dream-world of her 
own. 

“I think,” she said slowly, “that that’s work for a man 
—a real man, who is prepared to sacrifice everything for it, 
and to fight and be beaten again and again, but to go on 
fighting. It needs ruthlessness, a disregard of side issues, 
and a persistent concentration on the one essential aim. It 
means a neglect of the . . . the . . . what shall I call 
them? . . . the incidentals of life. Very few of us have 
that power. Have you, Mr. Carnes?” 

“Yes,” said Vaizey, unexpectedly; “yes, if he’d only 
realise the fact.” 

“Most probably not.” Alan’s smile was deprecating where 
any one but an Englishman, feeling as he felt at that mo¬ 
ment—buoyed up, elated, emotionally and mentally stirred 
—would have admitted his quality. 

“Mrs. Dighton, we’ve kept you up disgracefully late. 
Come on, Norman, we must go to bed!” 

He shared a single bed with Vaizey in the tiny room 
upstairs, and listened without much comment to his com¬ 
panion’s drowsy eulogy on their hostess and her niece. 

“Queerly pleasant pair,” murmured Vaizey. “Aunt Eve¬ 
lyn’s worth a guinea a minute, with her fanatical enthusiasm 
all mixed up with her staggering knowledge of facts—even 
though she does misapply them. And the girl; what do you 


THE BURDEN 


196 

make of the girl, Alan? Attractive, don’t you think? And 
deep. She knows something of life, that girl. I’d like to 
know her story. She’s got a story, I’ll stake my life.” 

But Alan, with the inside berth, as Vaizey had called it, 
and his nose within half an inch of the wall, merely grunted 
assent. 

“Jolly friendly, both of them—and kind,” he mumbled, 
longing for silence. On the morrow he knew that he would 
have to discuss Noel as a character with Vaizey. There 
was nothing that Vaizey enjoyed more than analysing their 
impressions of chance acquaintances; he did so love to 
classify people into “types.” But on the morrow he, Alan, 
would have had time to sort out his impressions and have 
ready for publication, as it were, only those which he 
wished Vaizey to know. At the moment he was rather 
sleepy and rather diffident. He was afraid that Vaizey, a 
perceptive-minded person, quick to draw inferences from 
one’s tone or one’s unguarded phrase, would see that this 
queer girl, with her downrightness that yet was not entirely 
downright, with her unusual hair, her eyes—honestly frank 
when one first met them, and yet baffling when one looked 
into them—with her knowledge and her zest and her cate¬ 
chising manner, and—he thought of this suddenly as he lay 
there pretending to be asleep—with those full lips that 
hinted passion, that she, Noel, had affected him strangely. 
She interested him as no woman had done since he had 
first met Christine. 

“She’s a force,” he thought, “an unknown, immeasurable 
force—like electricity. She’s got a brain—but it’s not her 
brain, altogether, that accounts for it. She’s physically 
attractive—yet it’s not just that. There’s something in her 
that I’ve never encountered before. And yet . . . some¬ 
how she reminds me of Chris. She’s something like Chris 
would have been at her age—twenty-eight or nine, is she? 
—if . . . oh, God, if! It’s her vigour, her physical fitness, 
her zest to know and understand. It’s what Chris had. And 
her intensity—she feels things; one can easily see that. And 
then . . . and then . . . that strange reserve—in her 


ALAN 


197 


eyes, in her whole expression, in her soul, so one feels. 
There was never that with Chris. I don’t understand her. 
... I don’t begin to understand her, but I’d like to. 
What did Norman say just now? That she’s got a story. 
A story—yes, that’s it. And the story would be the key to 
something rather strange. . . . Queer, very queer. . . . ” 

He fell asleep. 

When they started next morning Noel went with them. 

“I’m a good walker,” she said; “I won’t delay you.” 

They climbed for an hour, and by nine-thirty had reached 
the pile of stones which marks Dunkery Beacon, the highest 
point on Exmoor. Here they sat down to rest for a few 
minutes before parting. Below them a wide expanse of 
countryside was spread, dreaming in the sunshine. In 
front of them, due north, was the route that Alan and 
Vaizey were to follow—the Cloutsham, the Horner Woods, 
and beyond that Porlock; beyond, again, lay the Bristol 
Channel, very blue and lazy-looking, and, just visible in 
the extreme distance, the low cliffs of Wales. At this 
height, seventeen hundred feet above the sea, there was a 
breeze, though the sun was blazing down. 

They talked gaily as they sat there and made promises 
to meet again. 

“The truth is,” Alan said, “we’ve both fallen in love 
with your Aunt Evelyn, Miss Regnart.” 

“People do,” said Noel, and smiled at him, evidently 
pleased. . . . 

Vaizey looked at his watch. “It’s getting on for ten,” he 
said. “We must beat it, Alan, if we mean to catch that 
four-thirty train.” 

He hitched his rucksac on to his shoulders and turned to 
say good-bye. 

“Tell your aunt that we will be eternally grateful,” he 
said. 

“And don’t forget that you are coming to see my Ken¬ 
sington cottage later on,” Alan said, “and meet my wife. 
Good-bye.” 


198 


THE BURDEN 


He looked back when they had walked fifty yards or so 
down the hill. She was still standing where they had left 
her, a sentinel beside the rough pile of stones. He waved 
and she waved back, and then stood quite still again, shad¬ 
ing her eyes with one uplifted arm. The breeze blew her 
skirt against her legs; her white silk blouse, low cut with a 
broad, flat collar, fluttered. She stood there motionless, 
with blue sky for a background; her feet firmly planted, her 
whole pose suggesting strength, courage, independence of 
character, determination. 

Alan walked in silence for a long while. 


CHAPTER TWENTY 


,AN was glad to get back. Christine’s welcome, spon- 



l \ taneously affectionate, touched him. He found her 
alert, cheerful, and eager to hear all that he had to tell her. 

“Make a regular story of it, Alan,” she demanded. 

He made a story, describing the tour day by day and 
incident by incident. His story included a detailed account 
of the previous evening, with much praise of the delightful 
Mrs. Dighton and her attractive niece. He was anxious 
that there should be no subsequent accusations that he 
had been “withholding things.” 

“Sort of people one doesn’t meet every day, Chris,” he 
said. “Really interesting. Oh, it was a great talk, it really 
was. The old lady is a perfect dear. And I liked the girl 
awfully. I’m sure you’d be interested in them both.” 

“We must have them here some time.” 

“Yes. I gave them our address.” 

“What’s the girl like to look at? Pretty? How old?” 

“Hard to say. Nearing thirty, perhaps. Yes, I’d call 
her pretty. But . . . Chris, it’s queer, but there was 
something about her that reminded me of you—not in 
appearance, but in manner, and perhaps in mind. That 
zest in things that first attracted me to you, bless you. 
That’s why I liked her, I expect.” 

She picked up his brown hand and fondled it. 

“Zest in things,” she said thoughtfully. “It’s not easy to 
keep that up, now. I’m losing it.” 

“No, you’re not—not a bit.” He leant towards her and, 
lifting the heavy coil of brown hair that hung over her 
ear, kissed her there very gently. 

“I was grumpy before I went away,” he said. “But this 


199 


THE BURDEN 


200 

walk has done me no end of good. I feel ever so fit, Chris, 
and ever so . . . ” 

“Full of splendid resolutions,” she finished for him, 
smiling. “You dear old thing, it was my fault as much as 
yours. And I have missed you, Alan darling. Don’t go 
away again.” 

“Perhaps it’s good for both of us if I do—sometimes,” 
he suggested, clinging to what he knew had become an 
essential for him—the right to get away occasionally. “I’ve 
missed you, too. And I’ve done a lot of thinking in a quiet 
way—about you and about re-arranging things a bit. I’ll 
explain later on exactly what I mean. But now I want to 
hear all you’ve been doing. I’ve been talking about myself 
for hours.” 

He listened while she described the happenings of her 
fortnight alone. Her father had come nearly every day; 
his book was finished and he was absurdly excited over it— 
said it would “make ’em scratch their heads a bit at the War 
House”; he had been at tea one day and had met Max 
Errington—no, Max had not come often and she had 
dropped a quiet hint to Laura. It had been amusing to 
watch Max’s manner with her father—quite deferential! 
She’d been busy with her drawings, and had had quite a fat 
cheque from Marion Follett, with which she had bought 
Alan a little present; no, it had not come yet, and she 
wanted it to be a surprise, so he was not to ask questions. 
Guy Hyslop, so she heard, was awfully clever in this new 
revue; everybody was talking about him. She had had the 
Westrons to lunch. They were very full of their own doings 
and were pleased because they would manage to “do” Ascot 
properly this year. Laura had stated that she had “lost a 
packet” on the Derby. She had not seen Ronny, and Laura 
hardly ever mentioned him. Alan’s people were quite well; 
they had been very kind to her while he had been away. 
Mr. Carnes had told her that they were pretty busy at the 
office—some new scheme or other was being considered. 

She chattered on and he listened attentively, laughing 


ALAN 


201 


with her at her little witticisms, asking a question or two, 
showing his interest, but thinking to himself: “It’s all so 
little, so unimportant, so ... so dull, really. And that’s 
her life, poor darling.” But he had noticed, not without a 
tinge of resentment, her apparent lack of interest in this 
new scheme about which his father had told her. In former 
days she would have been eager to learn details, she would 
have recounted the details to him excitedly, and clamoured 
to be told how the new scheme would affect him personally, 
and whether it would enhance his professional reputation. 
Was she really indifferent now? But she would not remain 
indifferent—not when she realized how vital her encourage¬ 
ment was to him. When he had talked things over with 
her she would understand. She would see that he needed her 
encouragement if he was to do what Noel Regnart, in her 
low-pitched voice, vibrating with eagerness, had called “work 
for a man —a real man. ...” 

“Darling, I’m so dreadfully sleepy,” he said, and yawned, 
and then kissed her. “I’m so happy to be back again and 
I’m glad to-morrow is Sunday. We’ll have a real lazy day 
together, shall we?” 

He wheeled her chair towards the lift. 

The new scheme, he discovered on his return to the office, 
was important. A financial syndicate had approached the 
firm with a view to placing a large contract for a model 
village, on the lines of the Chingford one, to be built in an 
accessible part of Surrey. Mr. Carnes was hesitating over 
the offer. On the one hand, he disliked the idea of being a 
middle-man and not having direct control; on the other, 
however, he foresaw good profits, which would balance his 
losses on the Chingford venture, and there would be no 
financial responsibility. He vouched for the soundness of 
the syndicate. 

“Bob Swinscoe’s at the head of it,” he announced, “and 
I’ve known him in business these thirty years. Oh, the 
money’s there all right. It might lead to bigger things for 


THE BURDEN 


202 

you, Alan. Besides, I hate refusing work when we can take 
it on. Seems to me wrong somehow.” 

The offer was accepted, but the subsequent negotiations 
took time. There was an unexpected hitch over the title- 
deeds of the land to be purchased, and July was over with 
nothing definitely settled. Mr. Carnes advised Alan to take 
a holiday while he could. 

“Get dear Chris away for a change,” he advised. “She 
needs it and she’d go with a little persuasion. She’s less 
sensitive than she was, poor dear. I’ll give you a bit towards 
expenses.” 

Christine demurred at first, giving her usual excuse that 
she dreaded the inquisitiveness of strangers, but she yielded 
in the end, and, after much careful preparation, she was 
moved down to an hotel in the New Forest. She and Alan 
were there together for the first three weeks of August. 
It was the first time she had left London since her accident, 
and the experiment was an unquestionable success. She 
improved in health; and with better health came a better 
control of her nerves. There were no “scenes.” She was 
easy to please and easy to look after. She did not de¬ 
mand constant attention, but was content to lie in the sun 
with a book in the mornings while Alan went for long 
walks through the Forest. In the afternoons he wheeled 
her about in her chair; and later on, after the first week 
or so, he overcame her objections to motoring, and per¬ 
suaded her to trust herself in the special seat which he 
long ago had fitted to his car on purpose for her. They 
were happier together than they had been for more than a 
year. The feeling of constraint which had existed between 
them seemed to fade away, and there was a return to their 
former mutual tenderness and comradeship. Alan rejoiced 
in a situation which he felt to be very much easier and 
very much more hopeful. 

Choosing his moment, he talked to her of his work and all 
that it meant to him. He tried hard to show her that his 
ambitions were making tremendous demands upon him, 


ALAN 


203 


and that he could only be contented if he were given scope 
to satisfy those demands. He explained, and at length, with 
all the tact that he could use, that to be given scope meant 
that he must not be hampered by her. In using all the argu¬ 
ments that he had planned to use he felt himself to be ego¬ 
tistical to the point of selfishness. Why, he asked himself, 
should it be she who was thus called upon to make sacrifices 
for him, when it was upon her that the burden rested more 
heavily already? But he was at the same time conscious 
of the compelling power which his work had over him. She 
could do nothing in the world, he argued. But he could— 
perhaps; and he was bound to try. 

Christine was understanding and complacent. 

“I think I know what you mean, Alan dear,” she said 
quietly. “Long, long ago, I told you that I wanted your 
work to be the main thing in your life. I didn’t expect then 
to be in the way as much as I am now—no, darling, don’t 
protest, we both know that it is so. I understand you now 
and I agree with what you say because I’m calm and 
can look at it sanely. But you mustn’t always expect me 
to be like this. You’ve got to be prepared for—well, difficult 
times with me. I shall be cross and unreasonable, and 
jealous, and . . . and silly, like I’ve been before. But 
you mustn’t let that affect you. You must just go straight 
on in spite of me. Do you see?” 

“You’re very wonderful, my Chris,” Alan answered. And, 
indeed, at that moment he did feel that she was very won¬ 
derful. He forgot his past difficulties and his qualms for 
the future. He remembered only their comradeship and her 
splendid devotion to him. He was hopeful. 

He was recalled to London after they had been away three 
weeks. The contract for the new scheme had been signed 
at last and he was wanted at the office to begin work on it 
at once. Christine, with her father taking Alan’s place in 
looking after her, remained in the New Forest hotel. 

Alan was busy—more happily so than he had been since 
he had been at work on the Chingford plans two years 


THE BURDEN 


204 

previously. He felt fit and strong; he threw himself into 
his new task with all his old zest and energy, conscious 
that his powers to turn out good work had not diminished, 
but increased. He was sure of himself. His brain functioned 
efficiently, quickly. Ideas came—good ideas, original ideas 
of which he was proud. This new village was going to be 
a vast improvement on Chingford. He had more scope; 
it was to be on a larger scale, there was more money avail¬ 
able; the site—undulating instead of flat, and with a stream 
running through it—offered him a real chance to create 
something artistically striking. He forgot the August heat, 
forgot to feel tired when he reached his home in the evenings, 
and, after a solitary dinner, put in two, three, and some¬ 
times even four hours’ more work afterwards. He was alone, 
unhampered; he had no one to ask him questions and no 
one to waste his time. He knew that this was the best work 
he had ever yet done. 

The thought came to him sometimes, as, sitting in his 
shirtsleeves at the drawing-table in his study at home, he 
stretched back to rest for a moment, that this was how 
he ought always to live. It was inevitable, that thought. 

“Lord!” he would say to himself, “but if only this were 
always possible!” 

He drove down to the Forest for the first week-end. The 
general was courteous and almost affable. Christine, to 
whom he showed some of his rough plans, was enthusiastic. 
(Really enthusiastic, he wondered, or was it an attitude— 
her share in the pact about his work? But then there was 
always an unnatural atmosphere of restraint when her 
father was present, or even near by. Probably that was the 
cause underlying his vague feeling that all was not quite 
as it had been when he had been alone with her there.) 

“Don’t overdo it, and come next Saturday,” she said 
when he bent over her bed to say good-bye at six o’clock 
on the Monday morning. (“Must be at the office by nine- 
thirty,” he had stipulated.) 

But he did not go down on the following Saturday. He 


ALAN 205 

sent a wire instead: “Very sorry; can’t manage to come. 
Must get on with work. Love, Alan.” 

In actual fact he had felt that morning that he could not 
endure thirty-six hours of strained politeness with the gen¬ 
eral, coupled with the knowledge that the general’s influence 
on Christine would certainly be apparent. And in actual 
fact he did not go on working. He was conscious of the 
strain and knew that an evening off would be good for him. 
He gave Vaizey dinner at his club, and afterwards they 
sprawled in two huge armchairs, in an almost deserted 
smoking-room, and talked until a sleepy waiter turned 
them out. He admitted to Vaizey that he was compromising, 
“and succeeding, too, old boy. Things are infinitely better 
than when we set out on our tour. And I’m doing dam’ 
good work, let me tell you.” 

“Good!” said Vaizey. And again: “Good!” 

He was accosted halfway down Jermyn Street as he was 
walking home. 

“I’m sorry, I’m afraid not,” he said quietly, and passed 
straight on. 

“Pretty girl, too,” he thought. “Poor devil! It’s a rotten 
game.” 

He walked all the way to Kensington. The girl in Jermyn 
Street had not attracted him, but his meeting with her had 
affected him. Suddenly, and long before he reached his 
own gate, he realised that the old danger was nearer the 
surface than he had known. 

“No!” he said to himself. “No, by God! Not again. 
That’s done with.” 

But he knew that it was not done with. He knew in his 
heart that the struggle would begin all over again. He 
remembered the horror of the last—and he was afraid . . . 

In the middle of the following week he rang up Mrs. 
Dighton’s flat and discovered that she and Noel were home 
from the country. He talked to her for some time and told 
her that he was alone at home and working hard. 

“Couldn’t you spare one evening and come round to see 


THE BURDEN 


206 

us after dinner?” suggested Aunt Evelyn. “I’d like to hear 
more about this new village.” 

He knew that he ought to keep to his work; he knew 
that he would be wiser to stay away. But he also knew that 
he wanted to go there and that it had been in the hope of 
being asked that he had telephoned. 

“Delighted,” he said, “what about to-morrow?” 

He climbed the sixty-five stone steps which led to Mrs. 
Dighton’s flat and found it small and very simply furnished. 
But there were rows and rows of books on the shelves and 
a large number of newspapers and periodicals scattered 
about. Aunt Evelyn was pasting cuttings into an enormous 
album when he entered. 

“A fad of mine,” she explained, laughing. “I like to be 
able to turn back and prove to myself that my party is 
generally right in the long run.” 

“Always, according to you, Aunt Evelyn.” Noel laughed 
too, as she shook hands with Alan. 

They sat and talked for an hour or more. Aunt Evelyn 
drank tea and Noel smoked cigarettes, leaning back in her 
chair and flicking ash out of the open window. Each time 
that she did so her loose sleeve fell back above her elbow 
and displayed an arm that Alan noted as being beautiful. 
The talk was sometimes serious and sometimes light, but it 
was always friendly and easy. Aunt Evelyn, wearing her 
large spectacles, went on pasting her cuttings. 

“You won’t mind, I’m sure,” she said. “I’m rather behind¬ 
hand, you see.” 

Alan did not mind. He loved watching her there, so 
enthusiastic, so quick-minded, so up-to-date, so entirely 
delightful. He was made to give them full details of the new 
village scheme. 

“It’s another step forward,” said Noel, and looked at him 
with encouragement in her eyes. 

When he was going he said: 

“Look here, won’t you both come and dine with me one 
night and do a theatre or something?” And then he remem- 


ALAN 


207 


bered that Aunt Evelyn had said that she did not care for 
music. “What about a promenade concert?” he suggested. 

Aunt Evelyn thanked him but declined. She hardly ever 
went out at night, she said. Noel accepted. 

“But it will have to be Saturday,” she added. “It’s the 
only night I’ve got this week.” 

“That will do quite well.” 

But he had intended to go down to Christine on the 
Saturday. 

He took her to dinner at Pagani’s. She wore a brown 
dress with no vestige of trimming on it anywhere. But he 
knew enough to realise that its lines were right. Its brown 
was of the same tone as her hair, but of a lighter shade. 
It drew attention to her hair, making it look very beautiful. 
Her only ornaments were a green jade bracelet above her 
left elbow and an old-fashioned ring containing one large 
fire-opal on the second finger of her right hand. 

“Unlucky, isn’t it?” he said, pointing to it. 

“No; October is my month. And my mother’s, too. It 
was hers.” 

October! Yes, of course October was her month, he 
thought. She might have represented October as she sat 
there; the light brown dress—dead bracken came to his 
mind—the green eyes with their splashes of brown, the rusty 
browns of autumn in her hair—and . . . and—was it his 
imagination or was there some hint of the quiet sadness of 
autumn in her whole expression? 

He found that she left him to do most of the talking. 
Many men would have been annoyed at that, for most men 
when they pay for a woman’s dinner expect entertainment 
in return. But he was not annoyed. He was, on the con¬ 
trary, intrigued. He was wondering what lay behind her 
reserve. He was eager to penetrate that reserve. He thought: 

“I’ll say nothing and see if she starts a new subject.” 

He watched her in silence for a while. She twisted her 


208 


THE BURDEN 


wine glass by its stem, then drank a mouthful, then sat 
quite still. But suddenly she raised her eyes and asked: 

“When does your wife come back?” 

“In ten days or so. You must come and see us then.” 

She said politely that she would be delighted, but he 
was asking himself what train of thought had brought her 
to that question. 

“I’m not really a very good person to go to a concert 
with,” he said, “at least, not if you are really musical. I’m 
ignorant. I love it, but I don’t pretend to understand it.” 

She nodded. “I know,” she answered. “I do understand 
it. Or at any rate I think I do. Only not so much with 
my brain as with my emotions. I feel what the composer 
meant to convey.” 

“There was a time,” Alan said, “when I vowed that I 
would make myself understand. But I couldn’t, I found. 
So I gave up trying. And now I just sit and let my thoughts 
run on—whatever thoughts the music brings to me.” 

“A man I knew rather well during the war said almost 
the same thing to me once. He had no technical knowledge 
of music whatever, but just an extraordinary ear.” 

“I haven’t got that. Well?” 

“I taught him what I knew. He outstripped me in no time. 
He was a wonderful natural critic of music.” 

“I’m afraid you won’t be able to do the same for me,” 
Alan said. “I’m certainly not a natural critic. Still, it’s a 
popular night to-night, so perhaps it won’t be too far be¬ 
yond me.” 

“There’s a Beethoven symphony, though—I looked in 
the paper—the Fifth. You’ve read Barbellion’s Journal, I 
expect?” 

“The Journal of a Disappointed Man —yes. It impressed 
me enormously. But . . . ” He glanced at her, unable to 
see the connection. 

“Don’t you remember his note about the Fifth Sym¬ 
phony? It comes just after his extraordinary description 


ALAN 209 

of Sir Henry Wood conducting—fighting the orchestra, he 
calls it.” 

“I’d forgotten. What does he say?” 

“He says that it always worked him up into such an 
ecstasy that he wanted to throw himself down from the bal¬ 
cony. He also says that there were women sitting beside 
him knitting! And he adds that he supposed they would 
have sat knitting at the foot of the Cross.” 

“I’d forgotten,” Alan admitted again. “But I can imagine 
his rage.” 

“I can feel it,” she said. Her tone was almost fierce. . . . 

When the concert began she settled herself and looked 
straight in front of her through half-closed eyes. He turned 
a little so that he could watch her without appearing to 
do so. He watched her thus throughout each item of the 
programme. In the intervals between pieces she made one 
or two appreciative or critical comments, but otherwise 
said very little. Nevertheless, he had begun to realise that 
she had been accurate about herself when she had said at 
dinner: “Not with my brain, but with my emotions. I feel 
what the composer meant to convey.” But it was not until 
the symphony was being played—towards the end of the 
programme—that he obtained an unexpected revelation of 
her. He was watching her intently. She sat perfectly still, 
with her hands in her lap, but clenched tight. She leant 
slightly forward, so that her shoulders were not touching the 
back of her chair. It was as though she could not permit 
herself to loll, to be at ease. Her eyes were wide open now 
and her lips were parted. She seemed to be staring, but not 
at anything that could be seen within the concert hall. 
Again she gave him that strange impression that she was 
looking through into another world. And he knew by the 
look of her, by her rigid pose and her intentness, that she 
was listening with her whole soul and interpreting with all 
her emotions. She was, he felt, more than merely moved or 
stirred. She had been taken right out of herself, she was 
enraptured, enthralled. And it seemed to him that the veil 


THE BURDEN 


210 

of her reserve had been temporarily drawn aside. She was, 
as it were, spiritually naked. She had forgotten him, forgot¬ 
ten that he could see and perhaps would see too much. She 
had forgotten everything except the emotion roused in her 
by that marvellous pattern of sound. 

Alan turned his eyes away from her. He had seen what 
he was not meant to see. He felt as he would have felt if 
he had inadvertently read a few lines of a stranger’s love- 
letter. Yearning, solitude of soul, brooding passion, memo¬ 
ries—these seemed to have been revealed to him in the eyes 
and in the face of the absorbed and motionless figure beside 
him. 

She leant back in her seat when the final chord had 
quivered into silence and gave an exhausted little sigh. 
Glancing at her he could have sworn that she had gone 
pale. Her hands hung limply and she looked away from 
him. He refrained from speaking. Suddenly she said: 

“Would you mind awfully if we went now? I don’t want 
to hear anything more after that.” 

He drove her home. On the way she scarcely spoke, and if 
he had not seen what he had seen he would have thought of 
her as almost rude. She said good-night to him at the door 
of the flat. She seemed normal again. 

“I won’t ask you in,” she said, “because Aunt Evelyn 
will be asleep. But thank you ever so much. I’ve enjoyed 
the evening enormously.” And then, quite suddenly, she 
added: “You must have thought me queerly silent. It’s that 
symphony. It always affects me, rather—for a particular 
reason. It reminds me of a . . . of a might-have-been. 
Good-night.” 

“Don’t forget that you are coming to see us,” he said. 

“No, I won’t forget.” 

Driving home he caught himself wondering whether he 
would see her again before Christine returned; and when 
he realised that his wish to do so was a temptation to be 
resisted, he knew that he was in greater danger than he had 
ever been in before. 


CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE 


LAN resisted temptation. During the fortnight which 



A elapsed before Christine returned he did not see Noel 
again. He worked hard. On the plea of work he declined 
an invitation from Aunt Evelyn—an invitation which he 
would have very much liked to accept. When the week-end 
came he took no risks with himself; he drove down to 
the New Forest and spent the time with Christine and her 
father. He endured the general’s off-handed reception with 
exemplary patience, and he succeeded in suppressing his 
exasperation at the discovery that Christine was being 
adversely affected by her father’s influence. Christine was 
peevish, contrary, petulant. 

“Oh, you always think of your beastly work first!” she 
declared irritably when she had failed to persuade him 
to stay an extra day. 

“It’s very important—especially just now,” he answered 
quietly. 

He drove back to London early on the Monday morning, 
and all the way he was struggling with his depression. 

“That damned old man!” he thought. “It’s his fault—all 
his. She’s always worse when he’s been about. But how am 
I to get things settled? I thought she understood and was 
going to help. But she doesn’t understand—or, if she does, 
she doesn’t care. How the hell am I going to carry on? I 
can’t—like this. It’s unbearable. If only she wasn’t help¬ 
less, how utterly different things would be. She’d be as 
vigorous and as enthusiastic as ... as Noel is.” 

He thought about Noel. 

“Chris would be something like her mentally now,” he 
thought, “if it wasn’t for this cursed spine of hers. Ncxel 


211 


THE BURDEN 


212 

reminds me of Chris in some ways—Chris as she ought to 
be. That’s what attracts me in her. Is it, though?—partly, 
not altogether. Chris was never mysterious. Noel is. I 
wish I knew more about her. Some man must have loved 
her. Why has she not married? She’s passionate by nature, 
I’d swear to that. And if she loved—how wonderfully she 
would love! She’d understand love—giving rather than 
receiving—she’d feel that way about it, as I do, as we did— 
once. She’d know the meaning of comradeship.” 

But he found himself picturing her not as a comrade, 
but as a lover. He pictured her eyes softening to the man 
she loved, her body yielding happily to arms that held her 
close, her full lips returning passionate kisses passionately. 
He knew then that he himself desired her. He gripped his 
steering wheel tightly and stared at the road ahead of him. 
But he was thinking, in fear, of other dangers than those 
of the road. 

“I must not see her again,” he told himself. . . . 

Christine returned home. For the first week or so she 
was affectionate, good-tempered, considerate. He could 
see that she was making big efforts in self-control and that 
she was trying to fulfil her share of their compact. He was 
touched, but he was not hopeful. He had ceased to believe 
that his scheme of compromise was feasible. Already, almost 
indeed from the moment of her arrival, he felt himself 
cramped and restricted. In spite of the fact that she was in 
a complacent mood, telling him not to bother about her, 
but to go on with his work exactly as he had been doing 
while she was away, he could not concentrate upon his 
work. She was there, and he had to consider her. She was a 
brake on his activity. She was, moreover, a menace to his 
contentment—she who had once inspired him, comforted 
him, encouraged him. Her presence was profoundly disturb¬ 
ing to him. Valiantly he concealed that fact, concealed it 
even when she gradually lapsed to her former exacting 
cycle of moods—peevishness, depression, restlessness, ex¬ 
haustion, penitence. He let his thoughts turn to Noel. He 


ALAN 


213 


wanted to see her and talk to her. Noel could talk sense. 
She was interested in the world and its happenings, as 
Christine had once been; but Christine was content now 
with the trivial affairs of her own little coterie of friends. 
She was letting her intelligence rot. If she could be said to 
have interests at all, they were not his interests. She had 
ceased to be in any way a companion to him. Frequently 
she bored him. Whereas Noel . . . 

It was Christine who suggested asking her and Mrs. 
Dighton to tea. 

“Don’t ask the crowd, though,” said Alan. 

She was annoyed at that. “Why refer to my friends as a 
crowd?” she retorted sharply. “Still, if these people are so 
high and mighty ...” 

He was patient with her. “I only meant that they are a 
little different.” 

“Different? Or superior, do you mean? Oh, I know 
you despise all my friends!” 

He did, but he refrained from saying so. 

“I’d like you to meet these two by themselves,” he said 
gently; “but do as you like.” 

She did as she liked. She invited nearly a dozen other 
people, and though she made herself pleasant enough to Noel 
and Aunt Evelyn, she also managed to make it perfectly 
plain, at any rate to Alan, that she regarded them as in¬ 
truders into the circle of her intimates. She was stiff in 
her attitude, although the characteristic of the tea party, 
as a whole, was unconventional frivolity. He felt uncom¬ 
fortable throughout the afternoon. 

He stood by the door beside Noel while Mrs. Dighton 
was saying good-bye to Christine. 

“Did you happen to mention that promenade concert to 
my wife?” he asked suddenly. 

“Yes.” She looked at him until he dropped his eyes. 

“Pity—perhaps.” 

“You hadn’t told her?” 


214 


THE BURDEN 


“No. She’s ... she rather hates to be reminded of 
things which she can’t do herself.” 

He looked up again. 

“I see,” she said gravely. But her eyes were not grave. 
Her eyes were almost mischievous. Her eyes said: “No 
use telling me that. I know better.” And her eyes disturbed 
him. He said good-bye and went back to listen to his guests’ 
inanities, shouted above the lilting clamour of Guy Hyslop’s 
ragtime. 

“There’ll be the devil of a scene over this,” he thought. 

But there was no scene. Christine’s comments were 
colourless. 

“Quite pleasant people,” she observed casually, “but I 
don’t see that there is anything to rave about in either of 
them.” 

She said nothing whatever about the concert. Alan was 
relieved, but he was also surprised—and apprehensive. For 
here was an incident which was unprecedented in their 
relationship. He had taken a young and attractive woman 
out alone for an evening’s amusement and he had deliber¬ 
ately refrained from telling Christine that he had done so. 
She had discovered and she had made no comment. Yet 
she must be angry; he was quite certain that she must be 
angry. He realised how very far apart they were now. 
Frankness existed no longer between them; the real frank¬ 
ness by which they had set so much store would never exist 
again. His fault; he admitted that, as far as this one inci¬ 
dent was concerned. But he felt that it was only an incident 
after all. It was an indication, no more; a natural result 
of the accumulated details of months. 

“Damn it all! I’m only human,” he thought. “And there 
was no harm in that, anyway.” But he was afraid never¬ 
theless. 

“She seems to know quite a lot about your work, this 
girl, and to be rather impressed by it,” said Christine 
later on. 

“She’s interested in housing—as a social question.” 


ALAN 


215 

“You ought to take her down to the new place in Surrey 
some day.” Christine’s expression was blandly ingenuous 
and her voice betrayed no hint of a sneer. 

“Perhaps. But when are you going to come?” 

“Do you want me to?” 

“Of course I do, Chris dear.” 

“You haven’t suggested it before, anyway.” 

“Surely you know that I’m always ready to take you. 
Only I’ve been a little doubtful lately ...” 

“Of what?” 

“Of your interest in it.” 

“That’s unjust.” 

“Is it? I’m sorry, then.” 

But he did not feel sorry. He only felt certain that he 
was not being in the least unjust to her. She was not inter¬ 
ested in his work: he was well aware of that and he was 
resentful. He foresaw that she was going to be jealous of 
Noel—of Noel, who was genuinely interested, and possessed 
knowledge that would be of use to him. He knew that there 
was already cause for jealousy. But he was not the less 
angry on that account. 

In the end it was Noel whom he took to see his handi¬ 
work; and he took her not to Surrey village, but to Ching- 
ford. Twice he made arrangements to take Christine down 
to Surrey, and on each occasion she excused herself from 
going: the first time because of fatigue and a headache; the 
second time because “that damned dress-making woman” 
(thus Alan always thought of Mrs. Follett) wanted particu¬ 
larly to see her on business that day. 

Exasperated, Alan rang up Noel and asked her to spend 
an afternoon with him. 

“And I’ll tell Christine all about it this time,” he thought 
grimly. 

It was a golden day in mid-October, warm, sunny and 
windless. He left the office and met Noel for an early lunch. 
She wore a coat and skirt of greeny-brown tweed, and there 


THE BURDEN 


216 

were touches of green in a hat that suited her well. She 
looked fresh, healthy, alert. 

“She’s so alive” thought Alan, watching her. 

She said: “You didn’t know it, of course, but you are 
giving me a birthday treat to-day.” 

He raised his glass to her. “I wish you all that you 
would wish for yourself,” he said. 

She smiled. “That’s wishing a great deal more than you 
know,” she answered. “I want a lot.” 

“For instance?” 

“Impossible things, mostly.” He noted the hint of that 
vague, far-away look in her eyes. 

“I know,” he said. “Good Lord! I know that feeling.” 

“I’ve got a job, though, so I shouldn’t be grumbling. 
Assistant to the Medical Officer of Health, North Kensing¬ 
ton. Temporary, of course, and starting next week. It 
may lead to something. Anyway, it’s an occupation. I’ve 
been loafing for too long.” 

He congratulated her. “A pretty nasty neighbourhood, 
isn’t it, though?” he queried. 

“Awful in parts. When you’ve finished with your Surrey 
villas, perhaps you’ll turn your attention there.” 

“Buy out the landlords and give me a free hand, then, 
and nothing would please me better,” he said. “Work worth 
doing, that! But I shan’t ever get a chance to do it.” 

“Some one will, according to Aunt Evelyn, as soon as 
her people get into power,” she answered, smiling. “You’d 
better be prepared with a first-class, workable scheme.” 

He shook his head. “It’s not so simple as that,” he said. 
“I know your aunt thinks that government by her party 
means the millennium, but she’s wrong. It doesn’t.” 

“Quite so. But have you forgotten all you said that 
evening when we first met? You were full of optimism 
then; full of plans too.” 

“I talked a lot of high-falutin nonsense. This is a prac¬ 
tical world.” 

“Fine things can be done in it, though,” she retorted. 


ALAN 217 

“The fine things are done by men and women who are 
free agents.” 

“No one is a free agent.” 

“But some people are less free than others.” 

“I don’t understand,” she said slowly. “But I’m dis¬ 
appointed.” 

He met her eyes. “Are you?” he said. “If you knew— 
my God, if you only knew how disappointed I am! Now 
let’s talk of something else.” 

They talked of other things until they reached the 
Chingford village. He took her all over it, listening in 
delight to her comments and her praises, answering all her 
questions. But inevitably his mind went back to the day 
when he had first brought Christine there, and then to that 
other day when the foundation stone was laid. He felt a 
little ashamed. 

“I oughtn’t to have brought this girl here,” he thought. 
“It’s almost sacrilege.” And then: “But she’s devilish in¬ 
telligent. She understands things. She appreciates my work. 
Chris never did, really. She was just proud of it because it 
was mine. And now—oh, she doesn’t care a damn now!” 

The village was not yet completed, but some scores of 
houses were finished, and of these most were inhabited. 
They were attractive houses, and they had gardens which 
obviously would be attractive in course of time. There 
were young trees bordering wide streets. There were shops 
and a bank and two-thirds of a church. The church showed 
signs that it was going to be very good indeed. The group¬ 
ing of the more important buildings—bank, church, com¬ 
munal hall, post office—round a central oval of grass was 
effective. 

Noel was enthusiastic. “It’s most awfully good!” she 
declared. “You’ve managed to give the place a character 
of its own. It’s modern, and yet it doesn’t seem new in an 
aggressive way. It seems to me to express something—as 
a whole, I mean. What, though?” 


THE BURDEN 


218 

“‘Interests in common and a purpose in common—that’s 
what I’d like it to suggest.” 

She considered his words for a moment, glancing about 
her and taking in the general effect. 

“Yes,” she said at length, “yes, I think it does. But in a 
new way. You’ve not imitated the mediaeval town. That 
tended to express the same idea.” 

“I’ve not imitated anything—intentionally, anyway. I 
just played with ideas of mine, and this, such as it is, 
emerged somehow.” 

“It wasn’t so haphazard as that, I’m sure.” 

“No,” he admitted, “not quite. I had a design in my 
head—beyond the material design of the actual buildings, 
you know. I tried to give the whole village a meaning, as it 
were. You said just now that it had character. I wanted 
—this will sound fantastic to you, I’m afraid—I wanted 
to give it a soul. Men look at a picture, or read a book, 
or hear music—but they live in a place. Isn’t it conceivable 
that a place might have more influence over them than any¬ 
thing else can have?” 

“And the influence that you intended this place to have?” 
She was looking at him intently, so intently that he felt 
almost embarrassed; but he was flattered. 

“Friendliness, co-operation,” he answered. “Good-will, 
in fact. That’s all.” 

“It is much. And the results?” 

He shrugged his shoulders. “Good Lord! how should I 
know? None, I should imagine. They’ve got three lawyers 
here already, so I assume they are ready enough to quarrel. 
And they grumble much as other tenants do elsewhere. 
Oh, we’re not standing on Utopian soil at this moment, 
Miss Regnart, I assure you!” 

“Still',” she began pensively, “still, I like the idea. And 
.... it must be good to look round at all this and be 
able to say, T made it.’ I envy you. I do, really. You’ve 
got such opportunities.” 

“Envy me, do you? You’re wrong there. I’m not a 


ALAN 


219 


person to be envied. I’ve failed—in what really matters.” 

“Rubbish!” she retorted brusquely. 

“No—the truth. I can’t explain, though.” 

They were walking back towards the car. She stopped 
and suddenly turned to face him. 

“Why not?” she demanded. “I might be able to help.” 

“Nobody can help. It’s just—circumstances.” 

“Tell me.” 

Her voice had lost its imperative tone. It was soft and 
alluring as she spoke those words. Her eyes promised him 
sympathy, understanding, comfort. And he needed those 
things. But it would be disloyal, damnably disloyal, to 
discuss Christine and his life with Christine with this girl 
—he knew that. And it would be dangerous—he knew that 
too. He hesitated. He wanted very much indeed to tell her. 
She had said that she was disappointed. She had implied, 
very clearly, that she was disappointed in him. He hated 
that. He wanted to justify himself in her eyes. She stood 
quietly beside him, and though he was looking away from 
her he knew that she was watching his face. He said at 
last: 

“Let’s drive on somewhere for tea before turning for 
home.” 

He knew, as he said that, that he was lost, that inevitably 
he would tell her . . . 

They sat long over their tea in the back parlour of an 
inn. Through latticed windows they watched the still and 
peaceful ending of their golden October day. The light 
faded and shadows formed in the corners of the low-roofed 
room. But they sat on, talking quietly of many things. 

“Tell me.” 

She had not repeated her request. But those two words, 
and her tone and expression as she had spoken them, were 
still in his mind. He wanted her to understand. In the end 
he told her—much. She listened to him almost in silence, 
sitting back in her chair with her hands deep in the pockets 


THE BURDEN 


220 

of her tweed coat and the smoke from her cigarette curling 
up past her half-closed eyes. 

“It’s my fault, largely,” he said. “I ought to be able to 
cope with it, I suppose. I swore I could, and I’ve tried hard 
enough, God knows. But every day I realised more and 
more that I’m not equal to it. There will come a day when 
I shall shout monstrous insults at her and rush blaspheming 
from the house . . . Norman Vaizey was right after all.” 

“What did he say?” 

“That there was no middle course. Chris or my work 
—but not both. Now do you see why I say I’m not to be 
envied? Now do you know what I mean when I say I’ve 
failed? I have failed. I shan’t be able to put my best into 
my work from now on. I shan’t even attempt the real work 
that I ought to be doing—the work that you know well 
enough I ought to do. You said you were disappointed. 
But you despise me really for wasting my talents. And to 
no purpose, mind you. I’m no further use to my wife. I’m 
not devoting myself to her. Quite the contrary; I’m eager 
to shirk the burden of it all. But I can’t even do that. She 
saps my energy, wearies me, exhausts me . . . ” 

He paused and stared at her across the dimness of the 
room. 

“Noel—you can understand, surely. It’s hell, that’s what 
it is— hell!” 

She snatched her hands out of her pockets and sat sud¬ 
denly upright. 

“You’ve no right to talk like that,” she said, sharply. 
“Alan, listen to me a minute.” (He was quick to note that 
she called him by his name for the first time now.) “Listen 
to me. You ask me if I understand. I do. I’ve got eyes 
and a certain amount of common sense. I’ve been to your 
house, you know, and I’d—well, guessed a good deal before 
you told me anything this afternoon. I’ve thought about it 
a good deal.” 

She paused and tapped her cigarette against her empty 
cup. 


ALAN 


221 


“May I be perfectly frank ? 55 she asked. 

He nodded. “Of course . 55 

“That night at Wheddon Cross when we all argued after 
supper, and you gave us your ideas of what might be done 
—you impressed me enormously then. I said to myself 
afterwards: ‘Here’s a man with ideals and a purpose, and 
the right sort of practical enthusiasm. He’ll get things 
done . 5 I was excited. One doesn’t often meet that sort of 
person. I looked upon you as a man who was not going to 
allow himself to be turned aside by anything.” 

“You didn’t know then.” 

“But I know now. And I tell you this, as friend to friend. 
You ought not to let this affect you as it is doing. You 
said just now that you were wasting your talents. You 
mustn’t. It’s wrong. It’s the greatest crime there is. You’ll 
think me hard and callous, perhaps, but I look at it in this 
way. You’ve got it in you to do big things. You may not 
succeed; all your efforts may produce no visible result what¬ 
ever. But you’ve got to try, and to keep on trying all your 
working life. You’ve got to sacrifice everything else to that 
— everything.” 

“Even my wife’s happiness?” 

“Even your wife, yes. Because she can’t help you. I’m 
not blaming her—don’t think that—but she can’t help you. 
Therefore, she must not be allowed to count. It isn’t her 
fault, but that makes no difference. She’s—forgive me—■ 
in the way.” 

“But I took her—for better or worse.” 

“A noble phrase—but this is a practical world, as you 
reminded me just now. No human being has the right to 
thwart another human being’s chances of achievement— 
for the sake of a phrase or a vow, or even for love or any¬ 
thing else whatever. These ties—these unnatural ties— 
they’re like ivy—they strangle in the end. I’m not talking 
without knowledge. The best woman I’ve ever known— 
Aunt Evelyn—let her life be ruined by a man. He was a 
brute, but she stuck to him till he died. One of the best 


THE BURDEN 


222 

men I ever met threw up what might have been a fine 
career over here and went to farm sheep in New Zealand, 
because of a girl who behaved like a fool. Don’t waste 
yourself, Alan. You’ve got to cut free. You’ve got to tread 
your own road. But you’ve got to make it first.” 

“You don’t believe in faithfulness, then?” 

“It exists, but it’s more rare than we like to admit. And 
even then it’s often futile. We can’t control love and pas¬ 
sion. It comes—and, generally, it goes. To pretend that it 
is still there when it is not is a real sin. Some sins, so- 
called, aren’t real—but that is. Don’t you agree?” 

“Yes. But one can fight with oneself.” 

“Suppress oneself, thwart oneself, waste oneself—yes. 
Be honest. Look right through your illusions to the truth 
behind. You liked to think of yourself as Being of the 
‘faithful unto death’ type, didn’t you? You built up a castle 
of illusion and you lived magnificently in it. You might 
even have been living there still if things hadn’t gone wrong. 
But they have gone wrong and your castle is to let. This 
romance of yours is ended. Admit that to yourself. Go a 
step further. Admit that it’s a good thing—for your ambi¬ 
tions and your work. Those ought to be your life. You 
want it thus—and you know it. Anything else is just inci¬ 
dental.” 

She stood up. “I’ve been lecturing you in the most im¬ 
pertinent way,” she said, and gave him an intimate smile. 
“We’d better be going. It must be very late.” 

But he stood in front of her. With a quick movement 
he put his hands over hers. 

“I ought to be either hurt—or angry,” he said, “but as 
it happens I’m grateful. I shall remember what you’ve said. 
Thank you, Noel.” 

“I believe in you. I want you to do yourself justice.” 

“Give me your help, then, and your encouragement. The 
help and encouragement of some one who cares —that’s 
what I’m missing so frightfully.” 


ALAN 223 

He raised his hands to her shoulders and they stood look¬ 
ing at each other. 

“Noel, I . . 

But she turned quickly away. 

“Let’s get started,” she said. 

He arrived home half an hour late for dinner and found 
Christine in an irritable mood. He told her bluntly with 
whom and where he had been. He was half hoping that she 
would display jealous anger. He wanted, by adopting a 
haughty air of insulted innocence, to persuade himself that 
no harm had been done. But he knew well enough that 
irreparable harm had been done. He knew that he was 
deeply in love with Noel Regnart. 

Christine, however, appeared quite indifferent. Her irri¬ 
tability confined itself to other and quite unimportant 
matters. He was exasperated by her, and in concealing his 
exasperation under a show of patient solicitude for her 
during dinner he was filled with self-contempt. He sat in 
his study afterwards and tried to work. But he found it 
quite impossible to work. He could think of nothing except 
Noel. Only with an immense effort of will had he refrained 
from kissing her when she had stood there so straight before 
him with his hands on her shoulders. But he was glad that 
he had refrained. She might not understand—yet. 


CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO 


O N a foggy morning towards the end of November 
Alan sat at his desk in his office, neglecting a pile 
of routine work and reading, in a technical journal, a long 
and highly laudatory article on the plans of the model 
village in the north of England, of which he himself, if 
it had not been for Christine, would have been the architect. 
When he had finished reading he pushed the magazine aside 
and picked up his pen. Then he dropped it again. He was 
feeling exceedingly bitter. 

“They praise that” he thought contemptuously. “They 
call it a striking innovation—artistic, practical, economical. 
But Chingford is twice as good, and as for what the Surrey 
place will be when it’s done . . .oh! hell, why did I miss 
my chance there? My God! I’ve half a mind to take this 
home tonight and show it to Chris; she knows enough to 
realise that my work is a dam’ sight better than this. Per¬ 
haps she’d feel a little penitent. But—oh! what’s the 
good? I don’t mind now whether she cares or not.” 

He sat back with his hands in his trousers pockets and 
stared moodily at the calendar hung over his desk. The 
last few weeks had been very difficult. 

“I want you to do yourself justice.” Those words of 
Noel’s had been in his mind ever since she had spoken them. 
He had tried. He had set his teeth and forced his tormented 
brain to work, and work, and work. He had finished his 
book—“an excellent book” his father pronounced it—he had 
studied, and designed, and planned, until he was sick of 
the sight of a drawing board and a bottle of Indian ink. 
He had worked, but he had not done good work. Situated 
as he was, it was impossible for him to do good work. For 

224 


ALAN 


225 

he had not followed Noel’s advice. He recoiled from that 
desperate remedy. He was still trying to keep up appear¬ 
ances in his own home, still trying to take the middle course, 
now so infinitely harder because of his love for Noel. They 
had met several times since the day at Chingford. She 
had been friendly, but no more. She had not alluded to 
their discussion there and he had been thankful. But he 
found that he was obliged to keep a close guard upon him¬ 
self all the time that he was with her. 

“Yet she must guess,” he thought afterwards. “She’s 
thirty. She’s not a girl, she’s a woman.” 

He had induced her to tell him something about herself. 
She was the daughter of a sculptor. Her mother had died 
when she was twelve, and she had lived her father’s hand- 
to-mouth existence until she was twenty, when he, too, had 
died. 

“Father was a dear,” she explained, “and he did do his 
best for me. But he wasn’t a good sculptor, still less a 
successful one. He had splendid ideas about the independ¬ 
ence that every human being ought to have, but he stopped 
at that. The blunt facts of a hard world were outside his 
scope. If he had the money for the week’s rent and the 
next meal, he was content. If he hadn’t, he was still content. 
He lived in a kind of thought-world of his own. And he had 
pretty vague ideas about bringing me up.” 

Aunt Evelyn, her mother’s sister, had constituted herself 
a sort of guardian. Aunt Evelyn, in the intervals of grap¬ 
pling with a drunken husband, had found time to teach 
her niece that she would have to make her own way in an 
unsympathetic world on the £200 a year which she would 
inherit from her mother when she came of age. 

“I learnt the value of independence, too,” Noel had told 
Alan. “From father, independence of spirit—perhaps; from 
Aunt Evelyn, though you might not think it when you hear 
her expounding her social theories nowadays, a more prac¬ 
tical sort of independence—commonly called fending for one¬ 
self. Useful—very.” 



THE BURDEN 


226 

Alan heard how and why she had taken up medicine. 

“I’d picked up a bit of anatomy from father and from 
wandering round the studios of his friends. I couldn’t 
draw or carve, but I wanted to do something with my 
fingers. I fancied surgery. I qualified in 1917. I did war 
work, lots of it. I loved it. I was outrageously ambitious. 
I thought I was going to make a name. I was a fiery little 
patriot, too—the wrong sort. I used to have the most 
terrific arguments with Aunt Evelyn. She’d taught me 
feminism—her kind—and she was rabid when I didn’t 
follow her into pacifism. She used to say: ‘All war is wrong.’ 
I used to answer: ‘Except this one.’ We stuck at that— 
never got any further. But we never really quarrelled over 
it. And then towards the end I met Jim Lasseter. He 
didn’t make me a pacifist—nobody could have done that— 
but he made me a sceptic as far as the war was concerned.” 

She talked a lot about this Jim Lasseter. She seemed to 
want to talk about him. She had been great friends with 
him. He was a man with a most disconcerting faculty 
for looking facts in the face. He was the least gullible 
person she had ever known. He had opened her eyes. He 
had been through the war from 1915 onwards, until she 
had met him, recovering from a wound, early in 1918. He 
had undermined her faith in the unspotted righteousness 
of causes as propounded in newspapers. Having lost his 
own illusions he had taken hers and smashed them to 
atoms before her eyes—cheerfully, but remorselessly. He 
had a brain; an untutored brain, but an unbribable one. 
He was at no man’s beck and call. He possessed an amaz¬ 
ing clarity of outlook and an amazing gift of grasping the 
essentials of a problem quickly and accurately. He was a 
force. He might have accomplished big things. 

“And where is he now?” Alan had asked. 

“He went off to New Zealand, two years ago.” 

At that Alan had known. To New Zealand! But she 
had referred once before to a man who had gone to New 
Zealand—a man with a natural ear for music. And then, 


ALAN 


227 


later, to “one of the finest men she had ever known,” who 
had gone there to farm sheep “because of a girl who had 
been a fool.” It was plain, plain enough. They had been 
lovers, these two. 

“You’d have appreciated him, Alan,” said Noel. 

“I should have hated him, perhaps,” he answered, and 
looked hard at her. She did not ask him why. Evidently 
she knew why. She bent to light another cigarette. 

“He’s only written twice,” she said casually. 

But when Alan had left her he had gone away madly, 
childishly jealous of an absent and unknown man, whom 
he was never likely to meet, and who was farming sheep 
some thousands of miles away, and very much behindhand 
with his correspondence. 

“Damn him!” thought Alan. And then, with a sudden 
remembrance of her way of speaking of him, reticent for 
all her apparent frankness, he guessed her secret, was 
quite, quite sure he had guessed it correctly. 

“They were lovers—real lovers. She gave him—every¬ 
thing,” he said to himself. And a moment afterwards, “But 
he threw her over—he must have done. She doesn’t care 
now. But she shall care for me—by God! she shall.” 

He had not seen her since. But he meant to probe further. 
He meant to know everything. And he meant, sooner or 
later, to be more to her than this Jim Lasseter had ever 
been. Brain! He, too, had a brain, but he was letting it 
atrophy in his present cruel circumstances. He needed the 
sexual sustenance that had been denied him for so long. 
He could endure this deadly, lonely, uninspired existence 
no longer. He was a man. He needed a man’s rightful 
dues. He needed her. God! how he needed her. Give him 
her and he could “do himself justice” in his work. She 
had bidden him put his work first and look upon everything 
else an incidental. But he could not do that. She stood 
blocking his path. He would have to overcome her—and 
take her with him. He could not go on because of her. 
But he could not go on without her. . . . 


THE BURDEN 


228 

“My dear boy—why, it’s pitch dark in here! Why ever 
don’t you turn your light on?” 

His father had pushed his head in from his own office 
and found Alan sitting in a room in which it was quite im¬ 
possible to see. 

“I was—thinking,” said Alan, and hastily switched on 
his desk light. 

“Well, stop it! You’ve been doing too much of that 
lately. Come and have a bit of lunch with me at the club. 
Lucky it’s just round the corner. The fog’s awful.” 

They groped their way to that stronghold of Gladstonian 
Liberalism which old Mr. Carnes had assisted to hold for 
the past thirty years. 

“Bottle o’ Burgundy’d keep the cold out well,” suggested 
the old man, sitting down with a grunt of comfort at the 
table which was, to all intents, his exclusive property. 

“Two hundred and nine, George, and warm it.” 

He turned to Alan. “Now tell me what you were sittin’ 
mopin’ in the dark for,” he demanded. 

Alan smiled. “Oh, I don’t know I Bit depressed, I sup¬ 
pose, reading that article about the Yorkshire model village 
that we ought to have had the making of.” 

“Ah, that! Dam’ rotten design, too, compared with what 
you’d ha’ done. Pity, my boy, pity. I said at the time you 
were a fool.” 

“Dad, you know as well as I do that . . . ” He stopped. 
There was no need to let his father into that matter. 

“Done a nice deal over that big house in Lowndes Square 
this morning,” said Mr. Carnes tactfully, and then went 
on to comment upon “the wrong sort of people that has 
the money nowadays.” Mr. Carnes had been dealing with 
the “nobility and gentry” all his life, and he disliked the 
new rich. For all his Liberalism he was, in business at 
least, something of a snob. Mellowed by the Burgundy 
and drinking his glass of port after lunch, he became 
inquisitive. 


ALAN 229 

“You’re bothered about something, Alan, my boy,” he 
said. “Let’s hear about it. Not money, is it?” 

“I’m all right,” Alan answered. 

“Your mother says poor Chris seems pretty low just 
now. No trouble between you, is there?” 

He turned in his big armchair and looked intently at Alan. 
It was not easy to lie to Mr. Carnes when he looked at one 
like that. 

“Things don’t get easier as time goes on,” said Alan. 

“Ah!” Mr. Carnes examined the ash of his cigar. “She 
frets a lot, poor child, I suppose.” 

“Yes; and so do I. I’m human, the same as any other 
man.” 

“Course you are—and the situation ain’t a natural one. 
Bless me, I’ve thought about it often enough, though I’ve 
not talked much. It’s a hell of a job to stick it—to keep 
straight, I mean—that’s the plain truth, and that’s what’s 
worrying you, I know well enough. I’ve been watching you 
this long time now.” He sipped his port and then sucked 
his upper lip. 

“Don’t talk about it, Dad. What’s the good?” 

“Much better talk about it, you and I. We’re men and 
we understand each other. Think I don’t know? I was 
young myself once. Look here, Alan. Take a word of 
advice from me. It’s no good fighting against nature. You’re 
doing yourself harm by trying to stick it out. I’m fond 
enough of Chris, goodness knows, and if she were herself, 
so to speak, I’d find it precious hard to forgive you if you 
went back on her. But as it is, it’s different. A hypocritical 
fool of a parson might blame you, but no one else would— 
no man, leastways—if you . . . you know what I mean 
. . . now and again. It’s no more than human. See?” 

Alan knew his father well enough to realise that this 
advice of his had not been easy to give. Mr. Carnes was 
no puritan and he was no humbug, but his conception of 
the marital bond was a rigid one. For the thirty-five years 


THE BURDEN 


230 

of his married life he had kept himself absolutely straight, 
of that Alan was convinced. 

“You’re wise, Dad,” answered Alan, “but ...” 

“Sounds brutal, I know.” 

“But it isn’t any use, as it happens. I’ve tried it.” Alan 
blurted out his admission reluctantly. “Tried it a long time 
ago, when things weren’t as bad as they are now. I told 
Chris afterwards, and she understood in the end—or as 
nearly as a woman could. But it wasn’t much good then, 
and it would be no good now. Dad, you’re devilish kind 
and thoughtful, but you don’t quite understand. It’s not 
just physical, this. To buy an hour or two of so-called 
‘love’ is no good to me. It doesn’t satisfy—except physically 
—and it revolts me afterwards. I’ve had the real thing, and 
there’s a mighty difference, as you know as well as I do. 
I’m not a boy. I’m thirty-two. And if I give love, I want 
love in return. I’m more than an animal. I’ve got other 
cravings besides just those. The mind comes into it. Oh, 
can’t you see that? And can’t you see that when passion 
became impossible between Chris and me, the other side 
of our love for each other wouldn’t last for ever? We didn’t 
think like that then, but I know it now. If I’d been older 
it might have been possible. If I’d been forty-five, say. 
But . . . well, there it is. She can’t respond and I want 
response. I’m at the time of life when I want it most, 
perhaps. Do you see the temptation, Dad? Do you see 
how infernally dangerous it is?” 

“Is there—some one else?” And then, when Alan had 
nodded silently: “I was afraid so. I was terribly afraid 
that that might happen.” 

“It hasn’t happened yet—I mean I’ve not done anything.” 

“Then don’t—for God’s sake don’t, Alan. Go right away 
and fight it out of you. I’ll spare you from the office for 
two months, three, for as long as you like. But get clear 
of this while you still can. For Christine’s sake, poor girl. 
It would kill her if she knew. Damn it, boy, I’m proud of 


ALAN 231 

you and I want you to do the right thing. It is the right 
thing, believe me.” 

For nearly an hour Alan listened patiently, miserably, 
to his father’s pleading. “It’s hard, damned hard, and I’m 
not blaming you, but you must give her up,” persisted Mr. 
Carnes. But Alan dared not give his promise. 

“I’ll try,” he said at last. “I swear I’ll try. This is 
between us and no one else, Dad. Mother mustn’t know.” 

It was nearly four when they got back to the office. 
He found a telephone message from Aunt Evelyn asking 
him to dine. He rang up to refuse and Noel answered him. 
He was unnecessarily abrupt in his excuse that he was 
already engaged. The fog had cleared and he walked home 
through the Parks, cursing himself for having told his 
father and yet bracing himself to do what his father wanted 
him to do. 

“Now, before it is too late,” he told himself. “But I 
must see her once more. I must have a long evening alone 
with her. She cares—I know she cares—and I want her to 
know that I love her. I shan’t tell her so. I couldn’t—and 
then give her up. But I’ll let her see. She’s quick enough, 
she’ll understand. She’ll think me a fool. I am a fool. I’m 
unfaithful to Chris already in thought. That’s everything, 
morally. And yet Dad’s right, I suppose. It’s the straight 
thing to do. Oh, I’ve not had a fair chance. How on earth 
am I going to do anything that’s worth while in life now? 
. . . Noel, Noel, I want you. You were meant for me.” 


CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE 


/AN had made up his mind. He had made his reso- 



lution and he meant to abide by it. To his father, 
tactfully asking, “What about that holiday we were 
talking of the other day, old man?” he answered, “No, I 
won’t take it yet, anyway. But it’s all right, Dad. Don’t 
worry.” He forced himself to appear cheerful in his father’s 
presence. He was alert over business details. He was 
enthusiastic about any new project which the old man 
brought up for discussion. “May as well try to relieve Dad’s 
anxiety at all events,” he thought. “Get him to imagine it 
was just a passing fancy—soon over. No need for him to 
know that it’s the end of everything for me, this.” At 
home he made desperate efforts to be normal and so to give 
Christine no hint of the turmoil in his mind. 

“I must see Noel and I must let her know,” he kept 
telling himself. But he delayed seeing her. He drleaded 
the moment when he would have to say to himself: “It’s 
over. That was the end.” He dreaded his unendurable 
future. He was saving his final meeting with her like a 
child saving a favourite sweet in the box till last. More¬ 
over, he was waiting until he could feel perfectly sure of 
himself. He must set out to do that which he had deter¬ 
mined to do with the certainty that he would not fail when 
it came to the point. And he knew that for that he needed 
courage and a complete mastery over himself. 

He received an invitation to a dance given by some 
acquaintances of his whom Christine did not know. But it 
so happened that she saw the invitation when he opened it. 
She was in a friendly, placid mood. 

“Why don’t you go, Alan dear,” she said. “It’s absurd 
that you should refuse because of me. You love dancing.” 


232 


ALAN 


233 


He saw that here was a chance that might not come again. 
He could at least make his last evening with Noel a long 
one, without fear of questions difficult to answer. 

“All right,” he agreed. “I will.” 

And then, having discovered that Noel was free on the 
night in question, and would come out with him, he declined 
the invitation to the dance. But he felt ashamed. 

He met Noel at the restaurant, a quiet one, but a very 
good one. He had booked a corner table and he had taken 
trouble with the ordering of the dinner. She was in black, 
a very simple frock as usual. A fat Jew, dining alone and 
eating prawns unpleasantly, stared at her magnificent neck 
and shoulders as she passed him on her way up the room. 
Alan caught his eye and scowled at him. 

“Lecherous old swine!” he thought. “Curious how some 
men let that kind of thought show so plainly on their 
faces.” 

“Sorry if I’m a bit late,” Noel said. “I went to see Aunt 
Evelyn off and had rather a scramble.” 

“Why, where’s she gone?” 

“Only to stay with some people in Chelmsford until 
Monday. There’s some meeting or other down there that 
she’s interested in. She’d go a hundred miles, you know, 
to hear a good, slashing, anti-everything speech.” 

She seemed in a light-hearted mood. She was more talka¬ 
tive than he had ever known her. She enjoyed her food and 
the champagne which he provided, and she said so. 

“I’m very much a materialist in some ways,” she said. 
“I’ve not had much luxury—but I like it when I get it. 
I’ve seen the seamy side of existence and I hate it. I’m 
seeing plenty of it just now in this job of mine. Bestial con¬ 
ditions, Alan, that’s what they are. And I suppose I ought 
to be disgusted with the extravagance of all this.” She 
waved her hand—her very well-formed hand—over the 
table. “But I’m not, you know. Frankly, I love it. To 
me, to come here, after North Kensington, is like getting 


THE BURDEN 


234 

into a hot bath after a twenty-four hours’ railway journey. 
And I believe it would be to any one. I mistrust these 
people who shudder at luxury—most of them, anyway. It’s 
nearly always a pose. It’s as false as ... as the silly 
assertion that if the working classes were given chicken 
and wine and bathrooms, they wouldn’t appreciate them 
because they had not been brought up to them. The taste 
for the good things of life is jolly easily acquired, I’m sure 
of that.” 

He agreed with her. But then he was prepared to agree 
with almost anything she said, so long as he could sit there 
within two feet of her and watch the quick play of her 
changing expression and the smile in her eyes, and on her 
passionate lips, and the movements of a neck and shoulders 
that seemed to him to be of warm and living marble. She 
chattered gaily, and he tried to keep pace with her chatter. 
She described her new work, and she made her description 
amusing. 

“There’s misery enough,” she said, “but it has its humor¬ 
ous side if one can see it. One’s got to, too, or else one 
weeps. I think they realize that, the poor. They’re won¬ 
derful—the way they stick it all, and can still laugh quite 
often.” 

He answered her, encouraged her to talk. But he was 
thinking always that the moments were passing, passing, 
and that presently he would have to drop his hint and 
make an end of it all. 

She drew in the first deep breath from her cigarette and 
sighed the smoke slowly out again. 

“Am I heretic or an epicure,” she asked, “in stating that 
the first half of an after-dinner cigarette is the best part 
of the whole meal?” 

“A modern, that’s all. Now what would you like to do? 
I haven’t got tickets for anything. I wasn’t sure what you’d 
want to see?” 

“Sit here and talk for a bit,” she suggested. “I’m comfy 
and—lazy. But—pardon my inquisitiveness, Alan—but are 


ALAN 


235 


we supposed to be here to-night?” 

“No,” he answered. “I’ve dined with some people in 
Chelsea, and I am now about to go on with them to a dance 
in Oxford Square. And you—I don’t think you exist.” 

She shrugged her shoulders. 

“You’re unwise,” she said. 

“Yes,” he admitted. “Though I really was asked to that 
dance. “But I’ve been unwise in ... in various ways.” 

He hesitated. He knew that she was looking at him and 
he knew that now was his moment to make himself clear. 
His fingers played idly with the end of a burnt-out match, 
but his feet, crossed under his chair, pressed each other 
hard. 

“I’m probably going away for a good while,” he said. 

“Oh, really! Work, is it? Some new big job?” 

“No, not to work. Just to . . .to forget.” 

“Forget? Forget what? I don’t understand.” 

He compelled her to look at him. By saying nothing 
whatever, but by sitting perfectly still and staring at her 
he forced her to meet his eyes. 

“Yes, you do understand, Noel,” he said at last. 

“I suppose I do.” Her voice was suddenly very subdued. 
“I’m sorry,” she went on. “I didn’t think of that when I 
was giving you sound advice, as I thought it, that day at 
Chingford.” 

“You must have,” he retorted firmly, and noted that she 
did not answer him. 

“And now,” he said, “we won’t talk of that any more. 
We’ll go somewhere where there is light and noise and 
laughter, and a crowd. It’s Friday. There’ll be a gala night 
somewhere. We’ll wear paper caps and throw woolly balls 
about the room. And we’ll dance, we’ll dance till we are 
exhausted. We’ll enjoy ourselves and I’ll start learning 
to forget. We’ll enjoy . . .’’he paused for the fraction 
of a second, “our last time together.” 

She dropped the stump of her cigarette into her coffee 
cup. 


THE BURDEN 


236 

“I'm ready,” she said quietly, and stood up. Her expres¬ 
sion gave him no clue to her feelings .. . . 

It was barely ten o’clock when they arrived at the res¬ 
taurant which she had suggested as the one most likely 
to be amusing. 

“Amusing!” Alan thought. “Oh, God! Amusing—to¬ 
night!” 

Already the ballroom was crowded. They stood watching 
for a moment at the edge of the floor. 

“Shocking bad, most of ’em,” Alan said. “And it will be 
worse when the theatres are over. Come on.” 

They had never danced together before, and Alan, more¬ 
over, was out of practice. But he knew from the first second 
that they suited each other. He held her firmly and guided 
her skilfully. Her footwork was exact and she followed 
his every variation with unhesitating confidence. Technically 
she was perfect. But she was dancing, so it seemed to him, 
without inspiration. She was not stiff, yet she seemed to be 
holding herself in. She was light—indeed he was never 
conscious of her steps—and she obeyed the rhythm of the 
tune, but she was mechanically accurate, and no more. She 
lacked that abandon which was to him the last essential. 
She was like a pianist whose technique is beyond criticism, 
but who plays without “soul.” He was disappointed. It 
was not what he had expected. It was “out of character,” 
as it were. And then suddenly it occurred to him that she 
was doing it on purpose; she was restraining herself, refus¬ 
ing to let herself go. “Why?” he wondered. “Why? Is 
it because . . . But I’ll make her give in to me before 
we go. Somehow , . . I’ll make her, I swear I will!” 

The music ended and they sat down. 

“I knew from your walk that you could dance,” she said. 

“And I from yours, oddly enough. One can nearly always 
tell. But we’ll be better together later on. We’ll be accus¬ 
tomed to each other and we’ll be able to let ourselves go 
more.” 

They danced, almost continuously, for more than an 


ALAN 237 

hour. He did his utmost, but he could make no impression 
upon her. She was withholding—something. 

The crowd became a crush as people came in from the 
theatres. 

“We’ll go upstairs and have supper. There may be 
more room there, too,” Alan suggested. 

They sat close at the little table, and once or twice his 
knee touched hers under it. She seemed so very calm and 
self-possessed. The crowd began to make its ponderous 
attempt to imitate the spontaneous gaiety of a foreign 
dance-restaurant. Paper streamers were thrown about and 
scores of the woolly balls for which Alan had expressed a 
desire were soon littering the floor. Plain and elderly 
women, dowdily dressed, smirked under paper caps, and 
not realising that they were looking extraordinarily self- 
conscious, evidently hoped that their recklessness was notice¬ 
able. Two young men, not perfectly sober, but, on the 
other hand, not amusingly drunk, attempted hunting noises, 
but ceased abruptly when they found that they were being 
stared at. 

“We can’t do it in England,” Noel said. “It falls flat 
somehow. We have to try all the time, and that spoils it.” 

He drank nearly a whole glass of champagne. He was 
feeling utterly dejected. He had explained to her and he 
was certain that she understood. Yet she did not seem 
to care. She was indifferent, apathetic; and time was pass¬ 
ing. It was after midnight—his last evening with her. An 
hour, two hours more, and it would be over. The appalling 
future loomed. 

“Cheer up]” she said, and smiled. 

“Sorry. I know I’m gloomy. Would you like to go.” 

“Let’s dance one more. It’s not so fearfully crowded 
at the moment.” 

There was a magical change in her. He knew it before 
he had moved a dozen steps. She was dancing now as all 
the evening he had been aching for her to dance—with 
meaning, with abandon, with passion. The crowd did not 


238 


THE BURDEN 


see; there was nothing outward to be seen. They were one 
of two score couples, dancing noticeably well, but with 
perfect decorum. But he knew. From the sway of her 
body and the movement of her limbs in response to his, he 
knew that she had let herself go at last. Once he glanced 
down at her face. Her eyes were nearly closed and her 
nostrils were quivering. She wore that expression which he 
had seen once before on her face—on that evening at the 
concert. She was in a dream, unconscious of her surround¬ 
ings, unconscious of anything expect the magic of these 
perilous moments. And she was in his arms. She was held 
close to him. He held her closer still and felt her yield to 
him. Without a spoken word, without even a look, he had 
broken through her reserve. She was responsive; she was 
answering the summons in his dancing with an intimate, 
passionate abandon. He had called to her thus and she 
had answered. She wanted him as madly, as fiercely, as he 
now wanted her. She was his for the taking. 

She dropped into a chair with a little sigh. Her breath 
came quickly and her breasts lifted and fell under her low- 
cut dress. He filled her glass for her, and then his own. 
They drank and their eyes met over the rims of their 
glasses. No word was spoken for a long minute, but in 
that minute Alan’s resolution was swept away in the flood 
of his desire. 

“Let’s go,” he said suddenly. His voice was husky and 
he knew that the fingers holding the match to his cigarette 
were trembling. 

She only nodded. 

He stood waiting for her in the hall. He remembered, 
with his heart beating hard, that Aunt Evelyn was away, 
that the servant slept out, and that Noel would therefore 
be alone in the flat. He looked at his watch. It was only 
half-past twelve, and he would not be expected home till 
three or so. 

“I can’t help myself. I’m human. I want her, she wants 


ALAN 239 

me. I can’t resist any longer. Why should I? Oh, God! 
why should I?” he asked himself. 

The taxi door slammed upon them. Instantly he took 
her in his arms and pressed her lips to his—fiercely, pos¬ 
sessively. For one ecstatic second she responded to his kiss, 
then she pushed him gently away. 

“No!” she said. “Please, Alan, please!” 

He leant back in his corner, not trusting himself to speak. 
He was thinking: “Is it over? Did she only go mad for a 
moment?” His temples throbbed. 

Noel did not invite him in when they arrived. She got 
out of the taxi without a word and felt in her bag for the 
key of the outer door. By the time she had opened it he 
had paid off the taxi. Then he followed her up the long 
flight of stone stairs and into the flat. She dropped her 
cloak on to the sofa and turned to him. 

“It’s been such a jolly evening,” she said, and he knew 
by her voice that she was simply saying that because some¬ 
thing had to be said. 

“I’m glad you enjoyed it.” 

A pause—very tense and awkward—followed. He was 
aware of a sense of nerve-racking restraint. He did not 
dare to meet her eyes. She picked up several books from 
the table. 

“Aunt Evelyn isn’t awfully tidy with books,” she ob¬ 
served, and went across to the shelves in the corner. “Where 
did these come from, I wonder?” 

He followed her, standing behind her while she found 
the vacant places and slipped them in. Then he put his 
arms round her and drew her back against him. He stooped 
his head till his mouth was brushing the curve of her cheek. 
He was holding her without force, but she made no effort 
either to slip away from his arms or to turn round and 
face him. 

“Noel,” he whispered. “Noel, darling, what’s the good 
of trying to keep up this farce any longer? You know. 


THE BURDEN 


240 

you must have guessed long ago, that I love you. I can’t 
think of anything else but you. For weeks now you’ve 
been in my mind day and night. I can’t sleep because of 
you and I can’t work. But things being as they are I meant 
to make myself end it. I meant not to see you again after 
to-night. I meant to get away out of the temptation which 
has been so frightful all this time. But I wanted you to 
know, first of all, that whether you cared or not, I cared 
desperately for you. And I thought it was going to be all 
right, because, although you understood—I knew you under¬ 
stood, Noel—you didn’t seem to mind. I was hurt at that, 
fearfully hurt, but it would have made things easier all 
the same. But then came that last dance, and—oh! darling, 
my darling—everything was different after that. You love 
me in the same way that I love you—so much, so awfully 
much, that it’s frightening. I know you do. You showed 
me, darling. No mere words could have been as plain. And 
. . . and oh! I want you. I ache for you. Give me your¬ 
self, because you love me. Is it too much to ask, this once, 
before we make an end? Must we make an end, Noel?” 

She had been silent under the torrent of his words. He 
turned her gently in his arms until he could see her face. 
He bent his head, but she withheld her lips from his. 

“Oh, my dear, listen,” she said softly. “I beg you to 
listen, before it is too late.” 

“I won’t listen—not if you are going to try to talk cold 
sense when you know we are both mad. You love me, 
don’t you? . . . Don’t you?” he persisted. She was so 
close to him, her eyes veiled, her parted lips within an inch 
of his. His hands caressed her bare shoulders. 

“Yes, I love you—to-night,” she said. “But I’m dangerous. 
I’m afraid of myself, sometimes. I’ve spoilt one man’s life. 
I’d hate to spoil yours, Alan.” 

“It was spoilt already—till you came. You can mend it, 
Noel.” 

“Can I? I believe in you, I’ve told you that. I shall 


ALAN 


241 

always believe in you. But I shan’t always love you. I 
know myself. I know what will happen. You won’t want 
to ‘make an end/ as you say; but I shall. I will make you 
frightfully unhappy. You will find that there is something 
in me which I cannot give, something spiritual that a woman 
only gives once. And I’ve given it, Alan, don’t you see? 
But you will want that and so you will come to hatie me. 
You will become disillusioned and bitter and . . 

But he would listen to no more. 

“No,” he cried, and the cry came with passionate sin¬ 
cerity from his heart. “No. I could never hate you and I 
shall never be bitter. I’ve no illusions left. I’ve given, 
too. I know all that. But it is possible to give again—a 
second time. I want to give, and oh! Noel, Noel, I want 
to receive too—from you, my beloved. Let the future look 
after itself. I’m only afraid of it if it’s empty of you. It’s 
the present that matters, this impossibly wonderful present.” 

She made no further effort to resist his kisses. Under 
the vehemence of his passion she was strangely still. She 
stood quiet within his arms, her own hanging limply at 
her sides. But he called upon his whole will-power to rouse 
her, crushing her to him till even his own muscles ached 
with the strain. 

“You shall yield. You shall, you shall!” he thought. 

“Look at me,” he ordered. He saw her eyelids flutter. 
It was as though she was fighting to keep them shut, as 
though she knew that if she opened her eyes she would 
lose her self-control. 

“Look at me,” he ordered again. 

She opened her eyes. And though her body was passive 
in his arms her eyes were aflame. His heart bounded. With 
sudden inspiration he loosened his hold upon her and 
withdrew his lips from hers. She gave a little choking sigh 
and flung up an arm to his neck. 

“Alan, oh! Alan.” 

She pulled his mouth back to hers—and yielded herself. 


242 


THE BURDEN 


Christine was sleeping so soundly that Alan did not wake 
her when he slipped into his own bed in the dark at a 
quarter to four. 

“Thank God!” he thought. “I simply couldn’t have 
spoken to her now—to-night.” 


CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR 


cc TT’S not good enough. Things can’t go on as they are,” 
said Alan. 

“I warned you. Admit that, at least,” Noel retorted. 

They were sitting facing one another in a Lyons shop in 
North Kensington, with a marble-topped table and tea 
things between them. They had been meeting at that par¬ 
ticular establishment three times a week, and sometimes 
oftener, for the greater part of the past four months. It 
was conveniently near Noel’s work and it was scarcely likely 
to be used by any one whom Alan knew. 

“I warned you,” Noel repeated. “I told you that you 
would want more than I could give.” 

“You could give me everything if you chose. You could 
let me put an end to all this deceit and hypocrisy and 
lying. I hate it. It makes me ashamed. It’s a hideous situa¬ 
tion. Why won’t you do what I’ve asked you to do dozens 
of times, Noel? Why can’t we come out into the open 
honestly and face the consequences? It wouldn’t be pleas¬ 
ant, I know that, but it would be worth it afterwards. And 
we could begin a new life fairly and openly . . . some¬ 
where else, if you won’t face London. We can’t go on like 
this indefinitely. Besides, I want to do the straight thing.” 

“Bit late to think of that now,” she answered coldly. 
And added: “No, don’t be cross, Alan. I didn’t mean to 
hurt you. But I’ve explained so often. We wouldn’t be 
happy—you know in your heart that we wouldn’t. You’d 
always feel that you’d done a brutal thing in deserting a 
crippled wife.” 

“But I’ve deserted her now to all intents and purposes.” 

“No. You live with her—and she doesn’t know. Besides, 
243 


THE BURDEN 


244 

you’ll go back to her in the end, when you’re tired of me.” 

“I shan’t tire of you.” 

“Yes,” she said quietly. “And soon—quite soon. Then 
there’s your work. It ought to come first, but it’s suffered 
because of me. You talk airily about beginning a new life 
somewhere else and you ignore the immense difficulties there 
would be in that. You’ve got your opportunities now—but 
you’d lose them all.” 

“I shouldn’t care. I . « . ” 

“But you would—you know you would. Have you ever 
forgotten that missed chance up in the North? Of course 
you haven’t. You’re bitter about it to this day. That was 
only one chance, mind you. And yet you can pretend to 
yourself that you wouldn’t mind giving up everything. 
Believe me, Alan, I know you very well by now. I know 
perfectly well that you’ll never be contented unless you’ve 
got full scope for your talent. That’s been the real, inner 
trouble with you all along.” 

“It wouldn’t be if only you’d do what I want,” he retorted 
sulkily. “And if you feel like that about it, then let’s face 
the music and stay here in London. People aren’t so squeam¬ 
ish, I suppose, that they’d refuse to employ an architect 
because he’d been divorced.” 

“You forget me. I’d have to ‘face the music’ as well as 
you. And women who’ve been dragged through the mud 
in the Divorce Courts—especially unmarried women who’ve 
lured innocent, upright men away from their wives—are 
up against it in this sanctimonious world, I’d have you 
remember. I’ve got a career to think of, too, you know. 
I’ve got ambitions of my own.” 

“Yes,” he said. “I see. I was rather selfish over that 
part of it, Noel dear. But ... .” 

“But it isn’t that, really,” she went on quickly. “At 
least, it’s more than that. I don’t want to be tied. I was 
brought up to be independent—or rather, there was so little 
‘bringing up’ about it that I always was independent. I 
had to be or I shouldn’t have come through at all. And I 


ALAN 245 

value that more than anything on earth. I’m free now— 
as far as any one can be free.” 

“Well, you wouldn’t be a prisoner if you were married 
to me,” Alan said. 

“Yes, I should—in my sense. I couldn’t come and go as 
I chose. Would you like it if I suddenly said I wanted to go 
off to Paris for six months or a year on end to do research 
work? Well, that’s one of the things I mean to do in the 
near future. But you’d want me to be running a house. 
You’d want children, too. You wince at that, Alan—I 
know, I understand. But I hate ties—hate them, don’t you 
see? And I couldn’t stand being dominated over, either.” 

“Oh! don’t be childish, Noel. As if there could be any 
question of domination between us.” 

“That’s exactly what there would be. I don’t say that 
you are particularly dominating by nature, but when you 
realised just how independent I wanted to be, you’d be 
provoked into opposition to me—and there’d be endless 
trouble. I should hate you over it, and you—you’d prob¬ 
ably come to hate me, but you’d certainly think me a selfish, 
unbalanced, impossible person. And I am, don’t you see? 
There are persons who are simply not fitted by temperament 
for living with another person indefinitely. And I’m one 
of them. I want to live my own life by myself. I don’t 
want to have to share it with you or with any one else. 
But that’s what marriage implies. Well, I recoil from it. I 
can’t help it and I can’t explain it any further than I have 
done. All I know is that it is so. It’s happened before.” 

“With this Jim Lasseter?” 

“Yes. I loved him, Alan, and I shall never love any one 
else like that again. He wanted me to marry him. But I 
wouldn’t. I could not bring myself to hand my freedom 
over to him for life. That’s how I looked at it—and I was 
frightened. I trusted him absolutely. But I didn’t trust 
myself. I knew myself, and I was afraid that I would stop 
loving him and yet be tied to him. Can’t you understand?” 

“That he seduced you, I understand that.” There was 


THE BURDEN 


246 

fierce and jealous anger in those few blunt words. Noel 
flushed. 

“Unworthy of you, Alan.” She remained ominously 
calm. 

“Well, it’s true, isn’t it?” 

“No. I offered him myself. I made him take me because 
I wanted him to. I knew I loved him then, and I was proud 
to have him as my lover. I’ve never regretted it since. 
We were very happy for nearly a year. I gave him—all I 
could. But I reserved for myself my right to my own life.” 

“And then?” 

“He was not contented. He asked too much. He de¬ 
manded more of me than I could give and he tried to bind 
me. He wanted children—naturally enough, he wanted 
children. I was prepared to give him one child, but I was 
not prepared to marry him. He wouldn’t have it that way. 
He said I was spoiling his life—and I was. He persisted 
in urging marriage upon me, and I held out till at last 
I exasperated him. We quarreled. We had the most fright¬ 
ful quarrel. And then he left me. I’ve never seen him 
since, and he’s only written twice, but I know he went off 
to New Zealand. That’s all, Alan. But now you know, 
and now you can see, perhaps, that if I couldn’t bring 
myself to marry him, I could never marry you.” 

“But if he came back to you, you’d marry him,” said 
Alan, suddenly, with a quick look at her. The question, 
evidently unexpected, caught her off her guard. She flushed 
again and her eyes were troubled. 

“He won’t come back,” she said unhappily. 

“But if he did? Be honest, Noel,” Alan persisted. 

“Yes,” she admitted, “if only to try to make amends 
to him.” 

“No, because you love him still.” 

She raised her eyes to his and he saw an expression of 
yearning in her face. 

“Yes,” she said again, “I loved him then, and in my 
heart I’ve loved no one else. I’ve tried to get away from 


ALAN 


247 

it. I’ve tried to forget. I’ve made a life of my own. Oh, 
IVe been happy enough in a way! I’ve enjoyed things— 
plenty of things. IVe never let myself sit and mope. But 
I haven’t forgotten. I could never forget.” 

She was close to tears, and Alan noticed. Nevertheless 
he failed to be merciful. 

“These last four months,” he said, “you were happy 
in a way. You were making a life of your own—with me. 
You weren’t sitting and moping. You were enjoying things 
—plenty of things: those two week-ends we had together, 
for instance, when I was supposed to be playing golf; 
the many nights when I lied, and was ready enough to lie, 
God forgive me, about dining with Norman at the club, 
or meeting a business client, or ... or all the other 
beastly excuses that the erring husband uses in a common¬ 
place comedy of adultery. Weren’t you able to forget even 
then? You lay in my arms and thought regretfully of your 
absent lover in New Zealand, I suppose! You’ve let me 
down. By God, if ever a woman let a man down—down 
into hell on a rope that’s going to break—you’ve let me 
down! ” 

She covered her face with her hands. 

“Don’t, Alan, don’t! Can’t you understand?” 

But he went remorselessly on. 

“No, I can’t understand. I knew—or I guessed, anyway 
—that I wasn’t the first, but I thought you really cared. 
I thought—that night when we danced, when you danced 
as though nothing in the world mattered except just you 
and me—I thought then that we’d found each other—you 
and I, you and I. You wanted me and you showed me 
that you wanted me. You let me come into the flat. You 
stood there, devastatingly beautiful and knowing my circum¬ 
stances, knowing that I was wildly in love with you, and 
you didn’t stop me then and there.” 

“I warned you. You know I warned you.” 

“You did. You said you were afraid of yourself. You 
talked wildly about something you were unable to give a 


THE BURDEN 


248 

second time. But you gave me the whole of yourself then, 
Noel.” 

“I didn’t. You were mad with . . . with that kind 
of love, and you thought so then. But you’ve been thinking 
about it since—you’ve been brooding angrily about it since 
—and you know that I’ve withheld myself, really. Isn’t 
that how you feel? Isn’t it, isn’t it? Answer me that.” 

“Yes. But it’s only now that I know why. Because of 
this other man—a deserter, ten thousand miles away. Why 
did you yield at all? Why didn’t you keep your faith to 
him and let me keep my own? For I had kept it up till 
then. I’d given way once, but it was physical only, as I’ve 
told you since. I’d never loved elsewhere. I’d only taken. 
Why did you let me do the one thing that I can’t now 
forgive myself for doing? You’ve let me live in shame all 
this time, with my ideals smashed to atoms, but in the 
silly belief that it was justifiable because we loved each 
other. And all the time you cared nothing. Why? In 
God’s name, why did you do it?” 

She raised a defiant face to his. 

“Why? Because you swept me off my feet that evening. 
Because you were desperately unhappy and I was sorry for 
you. Because I understood you and believed in you as a 
man capable of big things. Because I realised that you 
were hampered and thwarted and baffled, and that you 
couldn’t do yourself justice while you lived in a state of 
repression. Because . . . because I wanted to wean you, 
as it were, from your situation.” 

“So that you lent yourself—out of pity. Thank you!” 

“Ah, don’t be bitter, Alan! This isn’t the moment to be 
bitter. I did love you then, that evening, in my own way; 
and I’ve loved you since. You stirred me deeply. You 
even held me for a while—and I didn’t mean to let that 
happen. But it’s . . . over now. You can’t hold me any 
more. You mustn’t blame me, Alan. I can’t help myself, 
indeed I can’t, and I want to be honest with you. It’s 
been an interlude, this. We’ve met and loved a little while, 


ALAN 


249 

and now we must go our separate ways. Perhaps we’ve 
learnt a little from each other; perhaps we’ll be a little 
happier because of what has passed. But our ways can’t run 
parallel any longer, my dear. In our hearts we are each of 
us faithful to the one who came first—you to your Christine 
and I to Jim.” 

“No,” he said. “No. With me, at any rate, that is 
finished.” 

She shook her head. “You think so now—but you’re 
wrong, Alan. You and I are people for whom the highest 
sort of love comes once only. There may be—incidents, 
episodes. But they are no more than that. They will be 
fleeting, transient. They will leave their marks—everything 
does that; but they will not really alter us. Nothing can. 
We live on our memories, you and I. We’ve given, once 
and for all, and we cannot take back.” 

There came into Alan’s mind the vision of a heather- 
clad Surrey hill, under blue sky and blazing sun, the look 
in Christine’s eyes when he had bent over her, the full 
curve of her lips just before he had kissed them for the 
first time. 

“Utterly and for ever”—he remembered his words. “It 
is so,” he thought. “It is so.” 

He said: “I understand. But I dread the future. Those 
memories you talk of make things harder.” 

“Of course they make things harder. But you’ve got to 
surmount the circumstances of your life, Alan. You can, 
and you must. I hurt you just now, perhaps, when I said 
that I wanted to wean you from your situation. But I 
meant it and you’ll find out in course of time that I was 
right. Live an inner, secret life on your memories if you 
chose. But don’t let them swerve you from your main 
purpose—which is your work. There will be other women 
in your life in the future, just as there may be other men 
in mine. But do not be afraid of that and do not be ashamed 
of it. Treat them—make yourself treat them—as incidental, 
no more. For that is all that they will be in the end. This 


THE BURDEN 


250 

sounds hard and brutal to you, perhaps, but it’s the right 
advice—for you.” 

“And Christine?” 

“Spare her all you can. If it’s hard for you, remember 
that it’s doubly hard for her. She’s got memories, too; and 
only memories. But don’t be a fool and confess to her— 
when things happen. You must stamp out sentiment over 
that—firmly, ruthlessly. Cling to the sentiment of the past, 
if you like, but live your own life and fulfil your own pur¬ 
pose—which is creative, Alan, creative. Nothing else 
matters. Nothing else must count. I’m right. Oh! I know 
I’m right. And now—we must go.” 

“But you?” he asked. “What about you?” 

“You’re not to bother about me. I can find satisfaction 
in work too. I’ve made up my mind to leave this job. I’m 
going to do research.” 

“Where?” 

“Abroad, probably. Perhaps I’ll tell you when I know.” 

They walked a little way and then found a taxi. He 
drove with her to Aunt Evelyn’s flat. For a long time she 
sat silently with her hand in his. Then she said gently: 

“Alan, you do understand, don’t you? You don’t think 
me cruel?” 

“No, I understand. But I shall never forget.” 

The taxi turned the last corner, and with a sudden, 
impulsive gesture, she held out her arms to him. 

“Good-bye, my dear,” she said. 

He held her to him for a moment, with renewed, fierce 
longing in his heart. Then he took her face between his 
hands and kissed her mouth very gently and without passion. 

“Good-bye. God bless you, Noel,” he said. 

She stood for a moment on the steps, with the same 
resolute independence of carriage that he had noticed when 
she had waved to him from beside the cairn of stones on 
Dunkery Beacon. And then she turned and disappeared. 
The taxi-driver accelerated and let in his top gear with a 


ALAN 251 

clash which seemed to Alan to indicate a horrible finality 
to everything. . . . 

Christine was already dressed for dinner when he reached 
home. 

‘‘Wherever have you been?” she demanded. “Your father 
rang up first from the office and then from his own house. 
He’s very agitated. He’s just heard that the Swinscoe 
Syndicate—I think that’s what he called it—has failed.” 

“Good God! Why, Chris, they’re the people who are 
financing our Surrey village. Where’s the evening paper?” 

“Here, I’ve looked—is this it? ‘Big City Failure.’ ” 

He took the paper from her. “Yes, that’s it. For a quarter 
of a million. Lord! this is going to hit us pretty hard.” 

“I’m sorry, Alan dearest; I’m awfully sorry,” Christine 
said. She stretched out a thin hand to him. “Is it going 
to spoil your chances?” she asked. 

“I’m afraid so, yes. But it’s Dad I’m thinking of— 
at the moment, anyway. His soul is in this work of ours. 
And we may have to chuck it now. We may have to let a 
whole lot of people down badly. I must ring him up straight 
away.” 

“Kiss me, Alan,” she said. 

He stooped over her chair and laid his lips lightly on 
her forehead. She pressed his held hand firmly. It was 
as if she was trying to prove to him that she meant to 
stand by him in this crisis, as if she wanted to be his com¬ 
rade again, as she once had been. He felt extraordinarily 
ashamed as he walked slowly across the room to the 
telephone. 


CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE 


I N a period when business firms were going into liquida¬ 
tion by the hundred and bankruptcies were as common 
as divorce cases, the failure of one particular syndicate of 
financiers—even though it were for nearly three hundred 
thousand sterling—was a useful “sensation” for the evening 
newspapers, and formed the subject of a paragraph or so in 
the following morning’s Press, but after that the matter 
ceased to be “news” and was ignored. The fact that the 
Swinscoe Syndicate had financed that eminent firm of estate 
agents, Carnes, Rutler and Carnes, to the extent of over 
ninety thousand pounds in the building of a model village 
was, for the moment at least, not divulged to a public 
which would in any case have been more or less indifferent. 
But it was obviously a very serious matter for Carnes, Rutler 
and Carnes. So serious was it that old Mr. Carnes broke a 
habit of twenty-seven years’ standing and arrived in his 
office at a quarter past eleven instead of at twenty minutes 
to ten. He walked straight into Alan’s room. 

“Well, Dad? Could you fix up anything?” Alan saw 
that his father’s face was drawn. Mr. Carnes sat down 
with his usual grunt. 

“I’ve seen Bob Swinscoe; had the deuce of a job to get 
in, but I did in the end. It’s no go, my boy, none at all. 
They’ve gone right under. I went into the figures as far 
as I could. It’s one of the worst messes I ever saw in my 
life. If we rake in a couple of thousand in the end, we’ll 
be lucky. Bob’s ruined—just about.” 

“How did it come about exactly?” 

“It would take me a week to explain—and I’m not clear 
as to details myself. But, roughly, it’s the same old story 
252 


ALAN 


253 

—trying to be too dam’ cunning, taking on fresh commit¬ 
ments before the old ones were through—chancing the old 
ones going through—taking risks that weren’t justifiable. 
They nearly brought things off. Tf only,’ Bob kept saying 
to me. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘but these aren’t the days to rely on 
“ifs.” ’ But it wasn’t any good arguing, and I don’t believe 
in hitting a man when he’s down.” 

“He’s let us down pretty badly, anyway,” Alan said, 
grimly. 

“But he wasn’t crooked. I’ve known him these thirty 
years and he wouldn’t play dirty with me. But you know 
what these finance fellows are, Alan. They’re middle-men 
in the worst sense. They live by their wits and their wits 
often aren’t as good as they think. They juggle with ex¬ 
changes and loans, and shares and ‘interests.’ They’re 
always out to get control of somebody else’s enterprise 
and work. They make money sometimes and they lose it 
sometimes—as now—but they’re always using it, that’s 
the point. When they are in a small way of business they 
just complicate the lives of a few humble people. When 
they’re more important personages they help—or hinder— 
people like you and me. But when they’re very big indeed, 
Alan, they play with policies and the destinies of nations, 
and they become the abiding curse of this world of ours. 
It isn’t fair, by God! it isn’t fair, that people like ourselves, 
who’ve got some sort of an object beyond mere money¬ 
making, should be just counters in a game of chance over 
which we’ve got no control. They use us, damn them! 
They use us, that’s all ...” 

Alan waited through a long silence. His father sat very 
still in his chair. He was breathing hard and it was evident 
that he was considering something. Suddenly he thumped 
his clenched fist down on Alan’s desk with a crash. 

“But I’ll not knuckle under,” he almost shouted. “I was 
wrong at the start, but I’ll do the right thing at the finish. 
I let them in. I let them put up the money because I was 
afraid to take the risk, and yet I was desperate keen to get 


THE BURDEN 


254 

another scheme under weigh. It was a thing we’d never 
done before—to take money from outside. Pity we did. 
They’ve sold us a pup. But it’s not going to make any 
difference. I’ve been in this firm for thirty-five years and 
I’ve been head of it for twenty. We’ve got a reputation. 
We’re going to hold it. We’re going to let nobody down 
—nobody. We’ve got houses building—hundreds of ’em 
—and there are people that want those houses, people that 
are counting on ’em and have paid their deposits. And 
as sure as my name’s Robert Carnes, they shall have ’em. 
I’ve figured it all out. I was up till four o’clock this morn¬ 
ing going into things. I took it at its very worst. I assumed 
that Bob’s crowd couldn’t pay us a bean, and I worked 
out how we stood. Here’s how it is.” He produced a huge 
sheet of paper covered with figures. “Examine it later, 
Alan. You’ll find it fair and accurate. I’m going to cover 
their liabilities. I’m going to put up fifty thousand pounds 
of my own money and I’m going to call on the firm for 
the rest—thirty-eight thousand odd—if and when required. 
The firm can stand it. I’m going to stand it somehow, even 
if I have to go easy for a bit. I’ve thought it all over and 
it comes to this; I’ve made some money in my time and 
I’ve lived comfortable. But what’s the good of money in 
itself? What’s the good of it if you can’t throw it in to back 
your fancy when you want to? I’m sixty—dam’ near—and I 
never gambled yet. But I want to now. I want it to be 
said of me: ‘Gad! The old man had guts, anyway. He 
believed in his own schemes.’ I do believe in ’em. I want 
’em to go on. I want ’em to expand and achieve something 
big—something that will lead the way. But . . . there’s 
one thing ...” 

“Well, Dad—what?” Alan stared at his father in admir¬ 
ing astonishment. 

“There’s you. This money that I’m talking of. It’ll be 
yours some day—if it doesn’t go down the sink, that is. 
You won’t suffer now. I’ll see to that. But you may in the 


ALAN 255 

long run. Will you back me in this, boy, or will you ask 
me to play a safe game?” 

“Back you, Dad! Good Lord! you didn’t think I’d 
hedge, did you? You knew I’d want to see the thing 
through with you, surely.” 

“I was—pretty sure, yes.” 

He stood up and laid a heavy hand on Alan’s shoulder. 

“We’ll weather this all right, Alan,” he said. “I . . . 
damn it all, I like it now! It’s going to do me good to be 
up against things. Everything’s gone too softly for me 
this last twenty years. I feel as though I was thirty again, 
with something to win. There is something to win. Now 
come on and let’s get to work. There’ll be plenty to 
think of.” 

Abruptly he strode away to his own room and closed 
the door. 

“He’s right about himself,” Alan thought. “He has got 
guts By Jove, he has!” 

He settled down to his own work with a new-found 
courage and new hope in his heart. He thought of his 
father with affectionate admiration. He was proud of 
his father and proud to be able to stand by him in this 
crisis. He experienced a feeling of enormous relief that 
he would not have to tell his father of his affair with Noel. 

“I nearly let him down,” he thought. “Thank God, I 
..didn’t, though. Thank God, that’s over.” 

It was thus that he felt now: glad that the end had 
come as and when it had. He thought of Noel, dispassion¬ 
ately and almost without regret. She had been right, he 
realised. Their attraction for each other had been swift, 
compelling—but transient. He had wanted her and he had 
taken her, but he did not want her now. His plan to get 
himself divorced in order to marry her and “begin again” 
was sheer madness. He had known that really all the time 
and had never really wanted it, though his obstinacy and 
her refusal had made him persist in demanding it. But he 
was thankful enough now that she had been wiser than he. 


THE BURDEN 


256 

How very wise, how very sane she was! She understood 
him and her advice to him had been sound. “Live your own 
life and fulfil your own purpose, which is creative/’ she 
had said. That was true and that was what he must do; 
that was what he was going to do. He thought back over 
all she had said to him in that long talk, and he realised 
that she had been right all through. And then suddenly 
he found himself thinking of Christine, of Christine’s sym¬ 
pathy for him on the previous evening, when the bad news 
had come; of Christine lying there helpless, but extraordi¬ 
narily comforting, putting her own unhappiness aside in 
order to share his worries, just as she had been wont to do 
in early days. 

“Memories,” Noel had said, “live on your memories if 
you like.” And: “In your heart you are faithful to 
Christine.” 

He perceived now that it was so. There had been an 
interlude; there might be future interludes (he faced that 
fact honestly), but for all that Christine would never be 
dethroned. Christine had been his first love. She would 
be his only love to the end. He was seized with a fierce 
desire to tell her everything and so to lift from his con¬ 
science the load which had been weighing upon it all this 
time, but he remembered what Noel had said: 

“Don’t be a fool and confess to her . spare her all 
you can . . . stamp out sentiment. You must.” 

In that, too, Noel had been right. Why wound Christine 
unnecessarily in order to ease his own conscience? Let 
her live on her memories and let him thrust all this 
behind him and concentrate on his work. Nothing else 
mattered and nothing else was to be allowed to count. 

“But, Chris,” he thought, “oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” 
And he vowed to himself that he would make greater efforts 
than ever to make life easier for her in the future. 

It was after seven o’clock when he got home. He had 
had a long and tiring day. 


ALAN 257 

“We’ve fixed it all up,” he said cheerfully. “At least Dad 
has. He’s been simply wonderful.” 

“Fixed what up?” Christine asked. 

“Why, this mess we’ve been landed in by Swinscoe’s 
failure.” 

“Oh, that!” she said dully. “I’d forgotten about that.” 

He was annoyed at her apparent indifference, but he 
concealed his annoyance. 

“Forgotten! Well, I’m blest! You are a queer child.” 
He laughed and kissed her hair. 

“Laura was here this afternoon,” she said. “She’s in a 
mess, too, I may tell you.” 

“What’s her trouble?” 

“Ronny is taking out proceedings for divorce.” 

u Nol Oh Lord, that’s devilish bad! I did hope it would 
never come to that.” 

“I always knew it would in time.” 

“What did she say? Tell me all about it.” 

“She said a good deal. I’ll tell you presently; but you’d 
better change first. It’s nearly dinner time.” 

“Never mind dinner. Chris, this is awful. Dad doesn’t 
know yet, of course—or mother? It will be a frightful blow 
to them, poor old dears!” 

“Do please go and change, Alan. You know I hate keep¬ 
ing dinner waiting.” 

He hurried upstairs and, changing, thought to himself: 

“Extraordinary, she is. Why fuss about dinner at a 
moment like this?” And then: “Oh, damn it all! Why 
the hell has this happened just now, of all times? Curse 
that fellow Errington. I suppose he’s the man. What a 
little fool Laura is! Why „ * . why”—he wrenched at 
his tie—“why couldn’t she have kept straight?” He looked 
at his own angry face in his mirror. “That doesn’t come 
very well from me, though,” he thought grimly. “But, 
hang it all, it is different with me!” 

Christine told him all the details she knew. Laura, it 
appeared, declared she was innocent. She had had a fearful 


THE BURDEN 


258 

quarrel with Ronny, who, slightly drunk and outrageously 
insulting, had accused her of being Max Errington’s mistress. 
He had said, moreover, that he had suspected it for a long 
time and that now, having got the evidence he wanted, he 
was going straight ahead. 

“Well, has he got the evidence?” demanded Alan. 

“Laura wouldn’t admit that to me. She declares she 
can account for all her time except one particular evening 
and she’s terribly afraid that that will lose her the case. 
And Alan, what do you think she asked me to do? She 
wanted me to say, if necessary, that she’d been here with 
me that evening.” 

“But, my dear child, that would be perjury.” 

“I’m quite aware of that, and of course I said I wouldn’t 
dream of it.” 

“I should think not! Well, and then?” 

“She became almost hysterical and of course I guessed 
that she must have jolly good reason to be frightened about 
that evening. First of all she begged and implored me to 
do what she wanted, and then, when she saw I wouldn’t 
budge, she began to be abusive. She said I hadn’t any 
charity, that I was hard and proud, and ‘superior’ and 
sanctimonious. And—oh, a lot of things that made me 
furious. I rounded on her at last and told her what I 
thought of her. I told her bluntly that I didn’t believe in 
her innocence and that she’d deserve all she’d get. Then I 
asked her to leave the house.” 

“O Lord!” said Alan. “O Lord! As if there wasn’t 
enough trouble already without all this. I’m sorry you’ve 
had to put up with this, Chris. Still, it’s over now as far 
as you’re concerned, anyway.” 

“Is it?” Christine answered. “I’ve not quite finished yet. 
Laura had some more to say before she left. About you.” 

“About me? How do I come into this?” 

“She started to talk about you. I’d said, by the way, 
how jolly proud of your sister you’d be when you knew this. 
‘You needn’t hold Alan up to me as a pattern of virtue. 


ALAN 


259 


thank you,’ said Laura, ‘because I happen to know better. 
I know more about Alan than you do, my poor innocent. 
But you ask him about his friend, Noel Regnart, and see 
what he says.” 

Alan felt his heart thumping. What did Laura know? 
How much had Laura said? Oh, damn her for her wicked¬ 
ness! 

“Please go on, Chris,” he said in a cold, hard voice. “I’d 
like to know everything Laura said.” 

“She said, or at any rate, insinuated, the vilest things. 
She said she’d seen you and this girl dining together in a 
restaurant on a night when she had understood from me 
that you were to be with Norman Vaizey. She said that the 
two of you appeared very well pleased with each other. 
‘Oh, nothing in it, of course,’ she said, ‘but if I hadn’t 
known what an idealist Alan is I should have said from his 
way of looking at the girl that he was madly in love with 
her.’ She said that that was some time ago—two months 
or more—but that she’d been interested to note, from 
casual remarks of mine, that you’d been dining out quite a 
lot since then. ‘Always with Norman Vaizey, I wonder?’ 
she asked, with a loathsome sneer. If I could have stood 
up I’d have strangled her, I think. I stopped her in the 
end by saying that unless she went away at once I’d ring 
the bell and have her put out by force. She went then.” 

“The beast! The little beast!” said Alan. But he was 
thinking. “I must lie. I must bluff this out somehow. Why 
in heaven’s name should it have happened now when every¬ 
thing is over and I was going to make a fresh beginning?” 

He saw that Christine was crying. He tried to comfort 
her. “It’s all right, darling, it’s all right. I’ll never let her 
come here again. You shan’t be worried any more.” 

She lifted up a pathetic, tear-wet face to his. 

“I was terribly upset,” she said. “You see, I could only 
lie here and listen. I hadn’t any answer. There was nothing 
that I could say to prove that she was making it all up 
just to spite me because I wouldn’t help her in her own 


THE BURDEN 


260 

affair. And then . . . and then she wasn’t inventing it all. 
You had said you were dining with Norman Vaizey that 
night she saw you. She gave me the date and told me 
to look it up in my diary—she knows I keep a diary. I 
did, and there it was. ‘Father to dinner; Alan out with 
N.V.’ And, of course, I remembered then that you’d once 
taken this girl to a concert and had never told me. It 
was that week-end, too, when you’d promised to come 
down to the Forest and then wired to say you couldn’t. 
And . . . and ...” Suddenly she put up her hands 
and, clutching the lapels of his coat, pulled him down 
to her. 

“Alan, I’ve been fighting with myself ever since Laura 
went. I’ve been thinking the most frightful things. I strug¬ 
gled not to, but I couldn’t help it. Make me feel safe 
again, Alan darling. Look at me straight and tell me that 
there’s nothing in it all—nothing that matters. Tell me 
that and I’ll be happy again. And I’ll be ashamed of myself 
then, for asking you.” 

She would have believed him; he knew that she would 
have accepted his word. But he could not give it. Sud¬ 
denly he realised that he could not meet her eyes and lie 
to her. She was Christine, and at this, the final test, he 
was faithful to her in his heart. Slowly he turned his head 
away from her. 

“It’s over now,” he said. “But there has been something 
in it. There was—everything in it, I’m afraid.” 

He knew that she was staring at him, though he did not 
dare to look at her. Her hands dropped from his coat to 
her own lap. She gave a little strangled moan and her 
head fell back on to the cushion behind her. He felt as 
though he had hit a trusting, smiling child with a heavy 
stick. Then at last he turned to look at her. Her eyes 
were wide open and she had gone as white as the ceiling 
at which she was staring helplessly. For a moment he 
thought she had fainted, and stood there stupidly, trying 
to remember whether people fainted with their eyes open 


ALAN 


261 

or closed. And then she spoke. Her voice was weak and 
flat; it was as though she was speaking through a muffler, 
or from another room. 

“Please go / 5 she said. “We’ll have to talk about this, 
but I can’t talk now. I want to be alone. I want to be 
absolutely alone.” 

She began to push her chair towards the lift. But her 
hands slipped on the smooth wood of the guiding wheels 
and the chair ran crooked. It bumped against the table. 
She seemed to have no strength left. He wheeled her to 
the lift and put her in. 

“Don’t come up, please,” she said. And repeated again: 
“I want to be alone.” 

“Yes, but I must see that you are all right,” he answered 
obstinately, and ran up the stairs while the lift was ascend¬ 
ing. He met her at the top and wheeled her into her 
bedroom. 

“Please go,” she said. 

He could say nothing to her, absolutely nothing. He 
went. 

He called for Miss Minsleigh, that model of efficiency 
and self-effacement. 

“Mrs. Carnes has had rather a shock,” he told her. “She 
wants to be alone, she says; but I think you’d better watch 
her for a bit after you’ve got her to bed. I ... I shall 
sleep in the dressing-room to-night, so as not to disturb 
her. And . . . and she’s a little hysterical, Miss Mins¬ 
leigh. Please take no notice of anything strange you may 
hear her say.” 

“Quite so, Mr. Carnes. I understand.” 

“Do you?” thought Alan grimly as he went downstairs 
again. He looked at the clock. It was not yet nine. An 
hour, at least, before he could reasonably go to bed. And 
even then? Sleep—how on earth could he hope to sleep? 
He dropped into an armchair and tried to think things 
out. Impossible to think anything out! Equally impossible 
to take his mind off the situation! What would she do? 


262 


THE BURDEN 


God! what was she thinking and feeling? He had hurt 
her as he had never thought to hurt any human being, least 
of all her. She was so wounded that she could not even 
cry. And all she wanted was to be alone. To be alone, 
that she might hate him the more for what he had done. 
To be alone with that terrible hatred of him that he had 
seen in her face when she had looked at him upstairs and 
said: “Please go.” 

But he loved her. In his heart he had never loved any 
one but her. Noel was nothing, had never been anything to 
him. But his burden had been too great for him. He had 
failed and he would fail again. No, he would not have 
the chance. This was the end, he saw that. She would 
abandon him now. She would cast him off. She would 
dismiss him as one dismisses a dishonest servant. That was 
what he had been—a dishonest servant. Yet . . .he had 
tried. He had failed only because he was human and a man. 

He sat huddled in his chair with his head in his hands. 

“God!” he muttered in an agony of remorse. “Oh, my 
God, my God! It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair.” 


CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX 


C HRISTINE did not come down to breakfast, and 
Alan went up to her room afterwards to see her 
before he left for the office. He hesitated for a moment 
outside her door. He would have liked to slip away without 
going in. He was frightened, literally frightened, of facing 
her. He had already learnt (from Miss Minsleigh) that she 
was not ill, though she seemed very tired and worried. Was 
there any point in seeing her? She had had time to think 
things over, but by the evening she would have had still 
more time. Would it not be better to wait till then? But 
he wanted to assure himself that she was not ill. He felt 
that he could not sit all day in his office without having seen 
her first, even if seeing her meant a deeper realisation of 
her hatred for him. He knocked and went in. 

“I just wanted to see how you were before I started,” 
he said. He stood awkwardly by her bedside, not daring 
to touch even her hand. She dropped her newspaper and 
looked up at him. 

“I’m all right, Alan,” she said. Her tone was hard— 
as hard and as forbidding as granite. She added: “If you 
can get away fairly early to-day, please do. There will be 
a good deal to arrange.” 

“Chris, what do you mean—arrange?” But he knew. 
She had already made up her mind, then. This was the 
beginning of the end. 

“We will settle it this evening. There isn’t time now. 
And besides, I want to consult father. I shall get him to 
come and lunch to-day.” 

“Must he know, Chris?” It was more than a question; 
it was a supplication. Alan knew what it would mean to 
have the general’s influence ranged against him. 

263 


THE BURDEN 


264 

“Of course he must know. He’s the only person left 
to me to rely on now.” She picked up her paper again. 
“You will be late if you don’t go,” she said. J 

At the door he turned. “Good-bye,” he said. 

She was reading and did not answer. . . . 

When he reached the office he found a note from his 
father and a letter from Noel. His father said: “This is a 
terrible business about Laura. She came here last night 
—and we made her stay. I can’t believe it and I can’t write 
about it. Your mother is in a fearful way. I’m going to do 
what I can in the morning. I shall see Ron first and, if 
necessary, this Errington fellow. So I shall be late at the 
office. Your very worried—Dad.” 

Noel’s letter was written from Aunt Evelyn’s flat. It 
began “My dear,” and it was long and had evidently been 
written with great care and thought. She had seen the 
news of the Swinscoe failure and appreciated how much 
difference it might make to him. It was because of that 
she was writing to him now, she said. She was afraid he 
would be disheartened, but she implored him not to give 
up his ambitions. She reiterated all the arguments which 
she had previously used. “Cling to your work, Alan,” she 
wrote. “It will be your salvation, and nothing else can be.” 
She referred to their past intimacy without reserve, but 
with the quiet finality of one looking back upon that which, 
having served its purpose, was over. “It was wonderful in 
its way,” she said, “but it could never have been permanent. 
Still, I think that each of us learnt something from the 
other, and so we need not regret either that it happened 
as it did or that it ended when it did.” She told him then 
that she was leaving London, but that she would not give 
him her address at present. She ended simply “Noel.” 
And she added, in a casual postscript, “I had a long letter 
from Jim Lasseter last night.” 

Alan tore the letter into small pieces and dropped them 
into his waste-paper basket. 

“I wonder,” he thought, “I wonder if she’ll tell him about 


ALAN 


265 


me when she answers that letter. And if she does, I wonder 
whether he’ll still want her. Or will he be a monstrous fool? 
They’ve still got their chance of happiness, those two. But 
I . . 

He picked up his father’s note and read it again. “Your 
mother is in a fearful way.” The words stabbed him. That 
little old lady, fussy over the small affairs of her life because 
there had never been any big ones in it to disturb her; 
that simple, placid soul for whom everything had always 
gone right, was “in a fearful way” now that she w“as con¬ 
fronted with a crisis. But there was a further crisis—his 
own—for her to face. And he, Alan, was more to her than 
Laura had ever been. She would try to understand, but 
she would not be able to understand. She would look at 
him with that puzzled look of hers which he knew so well 
and had so often chaffed her about, and she would say: 
“But why, Alan dear? How could you want to do such a 
thing when you love poor, dear Chris?” And, heartbroken, 
she would cry softly. He felt that he could not face her. 
He would have to tell his father and then he would have to 
go right away. And leave his father in the lurch? Leave 
the old man to wrestle alone with the business under these 
new and difficult conditions? Leave him, at sixty years of 
age, to face all this by himself? 

“No, I’m damned if I could do that!” he thought. 
“And there’s my own work, too. I’ve got to stick it out 
because of Dad and because of that.” 

“Cling to your work, Alan. It will be your salvation, 
and nothing else can be.” The written words were torn up 
now and scattered in his basket, but the phrase was stamped 
on his mind . . . work . . . salvation. 

He waited for his father to come in. 

It was after twelve when Mr. Carnes at last arrived. 

“It’s no go, Alan,” he said; those same ominous words 
that he had used the morning before. There had been a 
certain proud defiance in his bearing then; he had been 


THE BURDEN 


266 

prepared to fight on. But now he was a drooping, harassed, 
beaten-looking man. All the spirit had left him. 

“I saw Ron/’ he said. “Nothing will make him give 
way. He jeered at me when I said I believed Laura had 
only been flighty, and not more. He said he knew. I 
begged him to be merciful, for his boy’s sake, for your 
mother’s sake. He said he was sorry for her, but he couldn’t 
let that make any difference. As for the boy, it would be 
the best thing for him in the end to be quit of Laura. Laura 
neglected him, he said. But she doesn’t, Alan, not really; 
and she’s devoted to him in her own way.” 

“So is Ron, though,” Alan put in. “That’s about the 
one good thing that can be said for him.” 

“1 wouldn’t go so far as that. There’s good in everybody. 
But he was savage, and bitter this morning, Alan. I did 
my best. Damn it, I almost went down on my knees to 
him! But he wouldn’t listen. He just kept on saying, T’m 
going to have done with her.’ I saw it was no go, so I came 
away at last.” 

“Did you see Errington?” 

“Yes, I saw him. All he said, practically speaking, was 
to tell me to mind my own business. As though my own 
daughter wasn’t my business! He’d admit nothing and he’d 
discuss nothing, he said. But he gave me to understand 
that he’d fight the case—and win it. But I don’t trust him, 
Alan; I never did. He seemed cool enough; not a bit rattled, 
but—over-confident. Made me feel he was trying to bluff 
me. And I’m not easily bluffed. He’s a wrong ’un—in 
that way, at all events. And . . . well, it’s a bad thing 
to say, but I’m afraid the worst has happened, boy.” 

“It’s got to be faced,” said Alan. 

“Your mother’ll never hold up her head in Streatham 
again, and we’ve lived there thirty-six years this summer.” 

He lifted a haggard face to Alan’s. 

“Oh, I know it’s happening every day—divorce and all 
that; I know it’s thought nothing of nowadays! I’m not a 
hypocritical, puritan chap, pretending that human nature 


ALAN 


267 


is different from what it is. I understand things well enough. 
But when it comes to my own daughter . . . and with 
a man like that! A smirking, idle snob that’s never had 
enough honest work to do to keep him from getting decent 
women into mischief! God, it’s more than I can stand, 
that’s what it is! Alan boy, I was boasting to you only 
yesterday that I’d got guts, but I spoke a little too soon, I 
think. This . . . this has just about beaten me.” 

He sat silent at his big desk, with his shoulders bowed 
and his head in his hands. He was an aged, stricken man. 
And all this time Alan had been thinking: 

“But there’s more to come. There’s more, much more. 
But I can’t tell him now about myself and Chris. It would 
be too damnably cruel.” And then: “It mustn’t happen. 
It simply mustn’t happen. It would kill him, I believe. 
I’ll plead with her, I’ll beseech her—for his sake, not for 
mine. She’s very fond of Dad.” 

But he remembered the general. Useless to plead with 
him; useless to hope that he could be softened! He would 
be adamant, vindictively triumphant that all his predictions 
had come true. Least of all would he stir a finger for the 
sake of his son-in-law’s father. It was all useless, hopeless. 

Mr. Carnes raised his head. 

“We’re wasting the firm’s time, Alan,” he said with a 
pathetic, gallant attempt to smile. “What’s in the post 
this morning? Anything important?” 

He started to fumble among the papers on his desk. His 
hands were shaking. 

Alan reached home before five. The sight of the general’s 
hat and stick in the hall made him curse. The last thing 
that he wanted was to have to face Christine and her father 
together. But there was no means of getting upstairs to his 
study except through the living-room. Bracing himself to 
the ordeal he walked in, but the room was empty. Evi¬ 
dently Christine had stayed in bed all day and her father 
was with her upstairs. Alan almost decided to slip up to 


THE BURDEN 


268 

his study and wait there till the general had gone. Then he 
changed his mind. 

“No, I’ll face him here,” he thought. “He shan't say I 
was afraid to meet him.” 

He tried to read the evening paper. It was a quarter of 
an hour before the general came down. 

“Good evening, sir,” Alan said, standing up. 

The general nodded brusquely. 

“Evenin’,” he said. There was a moment’s pause. Alan 
offered the general a drink and a cigarette, both of which 
he declined. He also, it appeared, preferred to stand. 

“I’ve had a long talk with Chris,” the general began. 
“She’s told me—well, as much as she knows. It’s enough, 
I think. We’ve thought it out carefully, and she agrees with 
my suggestions. She will ... er ... set you free—I 
believe that is the usual phrase.” 

“Look here, sir,” Alan interrupted quickly. “Do you 
realise that Chris and I have not discussed this matter at 
all yet?” 

“There does not appear to be much to discuss, as you call 
it. I take it that you do not now deny what you yourself 
admitted last night?” 

“No. But ...” 

“That is surely enough, then. At any rate, it is all that 
Christine wishes to hear. She does not want to be given 
details of how and when and where—or why.” 

“Possibly not. But there is a certain amount that she 
has got to hear, and from me!” 

The general seemed to plant his feet even more firmly 
on the carpet. He was standing very straight. 

“There will be no force about it,” he said. “If there is 
any question of that, I stay here to prevent it.” 

“Of course there will be no force. But she is still my wife 
—I suppose you admit that—and I’m entitled to speak to 
her.” 

“If she will listen to you!” retorted the general. “But I 
am not here to argue with you, but to give you instructions. 


ALAN 


269 


Adultery is not enough by itself, as you no doubt know. 
Cruelty will have to be proved. Desertion constitutes 
cruelty, technically speaking. You will, therefore, leave 
here at the earliest possible moment—I would suggest to¬ 
morrow morning. The matter can then take its normal 
course. It would be a help if you would be good enough 
to supply us with the necessary evidence of . . . er . . . 
adultery. We would be glad to get the whole thing under 
weigh as quickly as possible. Have I made myself quite 
clear ?” 

“Yes,” said Alan in a steady voice, “yes, quite clear. 
But supposing I decline to be a party to this, supposing I 
don’t desert Chris, what then?” 

“Then she will desert you. She will come away and live 
with me. You will scarcely be so silly as to try to retain 
her here by force, I take it. But in any case you couldn’t 
succeed. One point is perfectly certain: she will not consent 
to live in the same house with you any longer. But we need 
not trouble about that. You want your freedom, I assume. 
You have given evidence of that.” 

“I have given no evidence of anything yet!” Alan said 
angrily. 

The general moved his shoulders slightly—his ultra- 
British substitute for a Continental shrug. 

“I do not propose to be drawn into an argument,” he 
said. “Christine will leave you and live with me. It will 
then be open to you either to live in separation—in which 
case, of course, you cannot marry this other woman—or to 
give in and do what I suggest, that is, allow Christine to 
divorce you. I think I need hardly say that we will not 
permit you to divorce her. Perhaps you will now be good 
enough to tell me what you propose to do.” 

“I’ll tell you nothing now. I’ll wait until I’ve seen Chris. 
This is a matter for her and myself. I resent your inter¬ 
ference.” 

“Not unnaturally. She’s helpless and I’m not.” The 
general dropped a piece of paper on the table. 


THE BURDEN 


270 

“Here are the names and address of the solicitors who will 
act for us. Please communicate with them as and when you 
think fit.” 

He walked to the door. Arrived there, he turned round 
abruptly with his hand on the handle. 

“You think me hard, pitiless, unwilling to make allow¬ 
ances,” he said unexpectedly. “Well, perhaps I am. I 
never liked you, and I thought you entirely unsuited to be 
my daughter’s husband. But I’ll admit this, she fought 
for you and she stuck to you, in spite of ... of all I did. 
I know her and I know that there must have been some¬ 
thing worth while in you or she wouldn’t have done that. 
And she was happy with you at the start—I’ll admit that. 
I’ll admit a bit more. When this accident happened, you 
took on the situation like a man. But it’s beaten you. From 
the first I was afraid it would. It would have beaten better 
men than you.” 

“It would have beaten any one,” cried Alan, from his 
heart. 

“No,” said the general gravely. “It wouldn’t have beaten 
the kind of man that was really worthy of Chris. It wouldn’t 
have beaten the kind of man that she thought you were. 
But you aren’t that man. There are devilish few of ’em 
about. Therefore I don’t blame you as much as I might do. 
But that is not to say that I retract one word of what 
we’ve settled, Chris and I. She can’t stand this sort of 
thing. It’s monstrous to expect her to stand it; she’s not 
strong—lying there—and she’s not altogether normal, poor 
girl. She expects too much, perhaps. Men are men—I 
know that. Therefore it’s better ended, once and for all. 
If it isn’t, this will happen again and again. She’ll never 
have any peace of soul or any rest. She’ll never be even 
as happy as it’s possible for her to be in her condition. 
And I mean her to be. That’s the one job left to me to do 
now. I’m going to do it. And you—you’ll be happier too. 
You’re keen about your work, I understand. You’ll be able 
to get on with it, unhampered. You’ll be able to go to this 


ALAN 


271 


other woman—I don’t know who she is and don’t want to— 
and marry her and have children, which I suppose you want. 
You . . .” 

But Alan broke in upon him with a passionate cry. 

“I don’t want children now. And there’s no question of 
my marrying the other woman. It was over, done with, 
finished, before Chris ever knew. It was madness, but it’s 
over, I tell you. I can’t live without Chris, I can’t live 
without her.” 

“You’ll dam’ well have to,” said the general—and closed 
the door behind him. 

“Come in,” said Christine’s voice in response to Alan’s 
knock at her door. She was in bed, but propped up with 
pillows into a sitting position. She was wearing a dressing- 
jacket of pale blue silk and her hair was loose. She looked 
very pale, and there were heavy lines under her eyes. 

Alan took the chair by her bedside. 

“I have seen your father,” he said. 

“He told you?” 

“Yes. Was it quite fair, Chris, to ... to plan all 
that before you’d seen me?” 

“Seeing you first would have made no difference. And I 
wanted to get it all settled. You’re agreeable, I suppose, 
Alan? You want to be free—to go?” 

“Want to go? Oh, Chris, you don’t understand! Will 
you listen to me? Will you let me tell you everything?” 

He saw her hesitating, reluctant, so it seemed, to hear 
more than the one fact she knew already. Her white fingers 
picked at the embroidered edge of the counterpane. 

“Yes,” she said at last. “I suppose I ought to know— 
everything.” 

She remained quite still while he was talking. Occasion¬ 
ally he glanced at her and saw that she was not looking 
at him, but was staring in front of her. She seemed to have 
concentrated her attention on a big photograph of him 
which stood on the mantelpiece at the other side of the room. 



THE BURDEN 


272 

He spoke quietly at first. He was anxious to explain 
before he started to plead. He withheld nothing in describ¬ 
ing the whole course of his relationship with Noel, and as 
he was speaking he was conscious that his every word 
was hurting Christine horribly. He loathed himself for 
that, yet knew that he had got to go through with it to 
the end. 

“That’s all,” he said at last. “It’s a sordid enough story, 
God knows, but it’s the truth.” 

“You loved her, Alan,” Christine said. 

“I thought I did. But I didn’t. I knew that I didn’t 
when it came to breaking with her.” 

“Nevertheless, you did love her. You may not love her 
now. Your love for her may have died out some time ago. 
But there was a time when you loved her.” 

“No,” he said. “Not really. You won’t believe me, I 
know, and you’ll think it wicked of me to say it now: but I 
never loved any woman but you. I never shall.” 

“I hoped you wouldn’t say that,” Christine answered. “It 
isn’t true, it can’t be true. This was different from that 
other time. I understood that. I realised that it was phys¬ 
ical and no more, as you said it was. But this was different. 
This was unfaithfulness of the mind as well as of the body.” 

He tried to protest, but she went on in her quiet, even 
voice: 

“Unfaithfulness of the mind. You didn’t merely take— 
you gave, too. That is what is unforgivable, Alan. And 
since it’s happened once, it would happen again if we 
stayed together. It isn’t fair to blame you too much. Even 
father realises that. Life has been very hard on you. I’ve 
been a trial to you in many ways—I know that. I’ve made 
things even more difficult for you than they need have 
been; there was that job I made you refuse, for instance. 
But J’m like that now. I shan’t get better as time goes 
on; I shall get worse. And so there will be more and more 
temptation for you to look for sympathy—elsewhere.” 

“No, Chris, no! There won’t be . . .’’he began. 


ALAN 


273 


“You think not, now, but it will be so, and in your heart 
you know it. That’s why I cannot go on. I cannot live 
under your roof, I cannot live on you and know that there 
are other women in your life, and that I am simply a 
burden to you. For that’s what I am, and will always be. 
I’m an invalid, but I haven’t lost my pride, Alan. You must 
see it that way, too. You must put yourself in my place for 
a moment. You must realise that this has hurt me more 
than I have ever been hurt in my life. Last night I lay 
here and prayed to God to let me die before the morning 
came. You see, I loved you, Alan, I loved you. It was to be 
‘utterly and for ever’ between us, you remember. But it 
hasn’t been. It’s over now.” 

“Ah, no! No!” he besought her. “Chris, my Chris, I 
have no right to ask you to forgive. I daren’t do that. But 
let me make amends as far as I can. Let me stay. For 
God’s sake let me stay with you and serve you.” 

She withdrew her hands gently from his, which had tried 
to hold them. 

“I can’t go on, I can’t go on,” she said. “I understand 
Alan, better than I did at first. Perhaps in time I may 
even be able to forgive. But to go on is too much for me. 
I must make my own life now, so far as I can. You will 
make yours better without me, and yours is more important 
than mine. What would be the good of going on, even if I 
could bring myself to do it? There would be no good, because 
there’s now no love. Ah! can’t you see how it hurts? I don’t 
want to live in this hideous present. I prefer to live in the 
past. For a long time now I’ve been living in the past. 
My silly little doings and interests don’t count at all. All 
my own secret thoughts are in the past. I keep on living 
over and over again the time of our engagement, and those 
four golden months after we were married. Memories— 
I’ve lived on memories all this time, Alan. I’ve enshrined 
in my heart the image of you as you were then. I mustn’t 
be robbed of that. I can’t part with that. But if you stay, 
I’ll lose it, don’t you see? Things will happen—as they’ve 


THE BURDEN 


274 

happened now—and I shall lose it, this image of you. And 
I want it. It’s all I’ve got, and I want it.” 

“Chris, Chris!” He knelt beside her. “Is it like that? O 
my God! is it like that with you?” 

“Kiss me once as you used to do—and then go,” she 
said in a low, unhappy voice. 

He stooped over her, and, slipping an arm under her 
shoulders, drew her gently close to him. 

“Then this must be the end,” he whispered. She wound 
her arms round his neck and clung to him, trembling. 

It was he who moved first. Very tenderly he loosened 
her arms from his neck. 

“I must go,” he said. “I must go now.” He stood up. 

But with a piteous cry she held out her arms to him 
again. 

“Alan, my Alan, I can’t let you go. Whatever you’ve 
done and whatever you do, I’m yours—utterly and for 
ever. I understand. I want to forgive.” 

“Oh! Chris, Chris ...” But he could say no more 
than that. He knelt down beside her again and, sobbing, 
hid his face in his hands. He felt her fingers gently stroking 
his hair. 

The voice of reason was silent. Forgotten were the plain, 
unalterable facts; that she was a cripple and would always 
be a hindrance to him; that he was a man with a man’s 
desires and a man’s failings. Forgotten was this burden 
which had proved itself intolerable. Forgotten, too, that 
knowledge which experience had given him—the knowledge 
that inevitably he would break faith with her again. He 
was to be allowed to stay with her—nothing else counted 
with him at that moment, nothing else mattered. The voice 
of reason was silent. 


THE END 

























































































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AUG 2 2 1924 





































































































































